A New Battleground
by AlphaGuardian
Summary: The remains of Team NOBLE go MIA during their mission to deliver The Package to the Pillar of Autumn. They find themselves staring down the singular threat to another galaxy: the Collectors. Follow Six as she teams up with Commander Shepard to destroy the Collectors and the Reapers.
1. Prologue

Background info and Prologue

**A Reclaimer? Here? At last! We have much to do! This installation must be activated if we are to control this outbreak! **

**I know that what you were expecting was probably the first chapter, but I need to clarify some things to address possible reviews. After that, I'll give you guys a prologue and then this part is done. So bear with me, this is boring for me too.**

**Special Thanks to DemonFireX for starting to plant this idea in my head. I can't wait for Crysis Effect 2 get back on a roll. 7hanks also to Bungie and Bioware for making such kickass games (Bungie, please. Take back Halo. They need you. **_**We**_** need you to make the games badass again.)**

**Characters: I will list all of those who are named that make appearances in the book, even if they are only mentioned, only appear in flashbacks, only have voice parts, or are only referenced in messages between characters. Boring, I know, but necessary to discourage those pesky "Oh, bring in so-and-so" or "So-and-so should make an appearance" reviews. Just… Tell me if I miss any major characters as I go. I'm not perfect. You do know that, right? RIGHT?! Please tell me you know that. (I'm just listing these off of the top of my head, so don't mind the disorganization.) [Subject to changes whenever I damn well please]**

**Halo: Carter A-259, Emile A-239, Jun A-266, Dr. Catherine Halsey, SPARTAN B-312 Noble Six (F), Cortana, Auntie Dot, Jorge S-052, Katherine B-320, Master Chief John S-117 (Mentioned only). (UNFINISHED. Don't want to give anything away.**

**Timeline: This will start just before the Halo: Reach level The Pillar of Autumn, after that, we fall into the ME2 and beyond timeline.**

**Aesthetics of Six and Shepard: Six's armor is as follows: Helmet: MJOLNIR MK. 5 (CNM), Left Shoulder: UA/Multi-Threat, Right Shoulder: Recon, Chest: HP/PARAFOIL, Visor Color: Blue, Knee Guards: FJ/PARA, Wrist: Tactical/TACPAD, Utility: Tactical/ Trauma Kit, Colors: Maroon (P), Forest (S). Shepard' armor and appearance will be detailed in the book, but for the most part, he'll use his default N7 armor. Or Cerberus Assault Armor (I love that armor!)**

**Six's gear: Six will keep her armor, and her weapons will be adapted to use thermal clips.**

**Six as a Spectre: Possibly, but not for a while.**

**Adaptions of Tech from Halo Universe to ME: On a small scale. Six may give the **_**Normandy**_** a single piece of Halo tech.**

**Shepard's background: Shepard is a Soldier class in ME2, then a Vanguard in ME3, with the Spacer background and the War Hero psych option. On Virmire in ME1, Lt. Kaidan Alenko was left behind.**

**New Halo characters: Possibly… Not saying nothin'!**

**And last but not least… (I put this off because I hate this kind of stuff. In books, not in real life.)**

**ROMANCE: (yay. That was sarcasm, if you can't tell) I have thought of this, and I can tell you… That I want you guys to give me input on what pairings you would like to see. But past experience tells me that I'll just have to decide for myself. So I already have. But I'd still like some input.)**

**Phew… Now that that's over, let's get to that prologue! (Go get yourself a cookie, you earned it. But only take one. I'll know if you took more.)**

** Extra Extra Special thanks also given to Winter's Sentinel and Eclipse-Luna for Beta-reading and putting up with all my errors and shit. I really appreciate it.**

** UPDATE: It seems that the previous prologue kind of sucked, so I rewrote it, hope you guys like it better this time, 'cause I'm not rewriting it again.**

"_For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life, and those who look only to the past, or the present, are certain to miss the future." 35__th__ United States President John Fitzgerald Kennedy._

_Planet Reach. August 30, 2552. ONI Sword Base. Dr. Halsey's Lab._

The remains of the legendary NOBLE Team sprinted down the corridor to Dr. Halsey's lab where she was waiting to give them a package to get off of Reach. The door at the end of the corridor opened up into a massive cavern with a central blue "orb" with contrails flowing into it.

"What is this stuff?" Emile, NOBLE Four, asked.

"Knowledge. A birthright from an ancient civilization." Dr. Halsey answered.

She turned and faced the four Spartans.

"This AI is its custodian, and she has chosen you as her courier."

"Chosen? By an AI?" Emile asked their CO, Carter.

"By _this_ AI, yes. Her measure of you carries as much weight as my own, perhaps more." Halsey answered.

Halsey stepped to the side, revealing the AI she was referring to. She stepped over to a nearby console and began punching in commands.

"You are to take her to the UNSC shipbreaking yards in Aszod. There, you'll find a Halcyon class cruiser waiting to get her off-planet."

"I understand." Carter said.

"Do you? Mankind is outmatched. When Reach falls, and it will fall, our annihilation is all but certain. Unless we can glean from this artifact a defense against the Covenant. A game-changer. On the level of the conical bullet in the nineteenth century or faster than light travel in the twenty-third."

"And what if we can't?"

"An apt question, if there were somewhere else to place our hope. There is not."

The doctor punched in one last command and the AI's avatar disappeared from the pedestal. Halsey removed a large canister containing a glowing data chip. She walked over and extended it to Noble Six.

"Take it, Lieutenant, she has made her choice."

Six looked over at Carter, unsure if she should take it, and Carter gave a slight nod. The Lieutenant placed her hands around both ends of the canister.

"Do you have it?"

"Yes."

"Say the words, please."

"I have it."

Halsey let go and Six stored the canister on her lower back. The five then left for a pair of Pelican dropships waiting outside.

"Doctor Halsey, Noble Three will escort you to CASTLE Base." Carter informed her.

"I require no escort, Commander." Halsey argued.

"Jun, make sure _nothing_ falls into enemy hands."

"I'll do what's necessary, sir. Good luck." Jun said.

"You too, rifleman."

Jun and Halsey climbed into one Pelican while Six, Emile, and Carter got into another. Carter sat down at the controls and started the dropship.

"I need a heading, Dot."

"At three kilometers north, turn right, heading 050." The AI said.

"Which leads to…?"

"The shipbreaking yards in Aszod, the only off-planet extraction point left on this continent. Covenant air units have decimated many small convoys in the area. UNSC cruiser _Pillar of Autumn_ is awaiting your arrival. Many Covenant vessels are making haste to the site as well."

"Wouldn't be a Noble mission if it were easy." Carter commented.

The Pelicans took off and began the journey to their assigned destinations.

"Damn! I can't shake these bastards!" Carter yelled.

"I got this!" Emile said.

Emile grabbed a nearby grenade launcher and fired on the pursuing Banshee aircraft. The blast got one, but the other evaded and launched a fuel rod projectile. The explosive hit the fuel reserves, but oddly didn't detonate them. Instead, the atoms mixed with those of the fuel that was in the lines and tank, creating a new element on the fly. When this was ignited, it became _very_ unstable.

"_Warning! New substance detected in fuel lines. Analysis shows that the fuel will hyper accelerate dropship. Seal bay door and change bearing to leave atmosphere_." Dot informed them.

The substance created a field around the dropship as it pulled up, launching the Pelican at speeds that were faster than light. The only things that saved the three Spartans were the sealing of the troop bay door, and their own armor. (**If you doubt me, read Halo: First Strike.**)

_SSV Normandy SR1. In orbit around Alchera. Terminus Systems. _

"Uh… Commander? We've got something on scanners. An eezo field, sir. Like someone used a mass relay, but the coordinates are way off from any trajectory that they would use." The pilot, Joker, said.

"Could it have been a ship drive malfunction?"

"Unlikely. The anomaly is too small to have an FTL capable drive core. Might be a shuttle, though."

"Move closer and scan again, Joker."

"Aye aye, Commander."

The _Normandy_ began to move closer, and Commander John Shepard looked out of the nearby viewport at the anomaly.

"It's not a shuttle, but it looks like a ship of some kind. Doesn't match anything in the database." Joker said.

"Could it be a new design?"

"I would know if it was. This thing is unknown."

"Any lifesigns?"

"Can't tell at this distance."

The _Normandy_ moved within five kilos of the ship.

"I've got something! Three vitals. No recognizable IFF tags though." Joker reported.

"So they're not Alliance?"

"Or any other species that is friendly towards the Citadel races, Commander."

"So pirates then?"

"Unlikely. They wouldn't be using such a small ship for a raiding party. My guess? This ship is not from any known world in the galaxy and used by an unknown species. Wait… we've got another ship on the far side of the planet. This one's a cruiser. At this distance, it looks like a Geth ship."

"Power up the _Normandy_'s stealth drive."

"Stealth drive is running, Commander."

The Geth cruiser turned and headed full steam towards the two smaller ships.

"Commander, Geth ship is on an intercept course." One of the other officers reported.

"They can't have detected the smaller ship at that distance, and our stealth drive is engaged. How did they find us?"

"That's not a Geth ship." Joker said grimly.

The cruiser's fore section glowed with an orange light, and seconds later, discharged in a highly concentrated beam that shore the small ship's port (**Left**) side off. The rest exploded seconds later as the fuel ignited.

"DAMN! Joker, scan the region where the ship is, did any of them escape?"

"All three did, sir. Only one has stable vital signs though."

"What about the other two?"

"They're thrashing around; most likely their suits got punctured. They'll be dead before we can get them."

"Swing around so that the survivor can land in the _Normandy_'s shuttle bay, and then get us the hell out of here!"

"On it, Commander."

Shepard went down to the shuttle bay as the door opened and the person crashed inside. He hung back a bit, nervous as to the person's intentions. The other crew members in the hangar all tensed up as well. A few had even unslung their weapons, but the person was unaware. They just stayed on the floor, still and silent. They finally got up and observed the bay, and upon seeing weapons unslung, reached over their back and drew out what looked like an assault rifle.

"Not a good idea." A clearly human female voice said.

She grabbed the back of her weapon, yanked out a clip of ammo, and slammed a fresh one in. She aimed the rifle at Shepard's head, intending to take it off if anyone tried anything.

"If you're the ranking officer here, I suggest you tell them to chill before someone losses a head."

Shepard signaled to the crew members to lower their weapons. The woman lowered hers as well.

"Where the hell am I? Where are my teammates?"

"We're in the Terminus Systems, and your teammates didn't make it. They died from the exposure and ruptures to their suits."

Shepard thought he heard her swear under her breath, but wasn't sure.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Commander Shepard, Alliance Navy."

"Alliance? That's new. So are the Terminus Systems." She said, muttering something else under her breath.

"What?"

"Not your concern. So now the big question: are we going to get along, or am I going to have to kill you?"

"I should ask you the same thing."

She was silent for a second, then walked over to Shepard. The crew members unslung their weapons out of pure habit, but the woman was unfazed. She merely ignored them and stuck out her hand to the Commander.

"Friendly."

Shepard shook her hand, and was then thrown off his feet as the ship shook.

"_We've been hit! Kinetic barriers down! Multiple hull breaches! All hands abandon ship!_" Joker yelled over the intercom.

"Come on! Get to the escape pods! Go!" Shepard yelled at the crew.

Six was still suspicious of the Commander, but decided to put that off until _after_ they were off the doomed ship.

"Where are the escape pods?"

Deck 2, follow me!" He ran off for an elevator up to the upper decks.

Six followed close behind and clambered in alongside him. The elevator was too slow, so Six tore a hole in the ceiling and jumped out, leaving an astonished Shepard behind. An armored hand came back through the hole. Shepard took it and was effortlessly hauled out of the elevator. The woman jumped up to the next deck and hauled him up behind her. The two took off for the CIC as the pilot activated a distress beacon.

"_Mayday! This is SSV Normandy! Under heavy attack from an unknown enemy! Sustained major damage! Any Alliance ships please respond!_"

The pair ventured into the CIC, where they found a few dead bodies and a few live one running for the escape pods. Shepard kept going, as the pilot had not left yet.

"Joker! You need to leave!" He said as he entered the sealed cockpit.

"No! I can still save her!" The pilot said, referring to the ship.

"The _Normandy_ is lost, Joker. Going down with it won't change that." Shepard said, placing his hand on the pilot's shoulder.

"Alright. Help me up." He said, sighing in defeat.

Shepard and Six helped the pilot up and carried him to the last escape pod. As Shepard and Six were about to get in, another beam gutted the ship, sending them flying. In a split-second decision, Shepard hit the button and released the escape pod, leaving just them without a way out of the vacuum.

The silence was… almost serene. Were it not for the abundance of wreckage around the Spartan Lieutenant, she could have stared at the depths of space for hours. Another beam sliced into the wreckage around the pair, shooting them into a trajectory that would make them crash-land on the nearby planet. Six began to look around, searching for the Commander. She may not have known him, but she wasn't losing anyone else today of she could prevent it. She finally found him about 100 meters ahead of her and about 200 meters to her left. He was flailing around wildly, and the white plumes around him told her that his suit was compromised. She shut her eyes, and waited for the inevitable crash landing. About 5 minutes later, she entered the atmosphere, and her armor began to glow with the heat. Her shields were able to hold, but immediately collapsed when she hit the ground. She felt more than a few ribs shatter, as she landed on her stomach, and the pain told her that her right arm and her left leg were both broken, if only moderately, but the armor's systems told her that her femoral artery had been sliced open, and she had moderate internal bleeding.

_I'll be dead in 5 minutes. Wait! The Package!_ She thought, reaching around to her back with her left arm.

She found the canister still intact on her back, although it had a few cracks in it. She relaxed, knowing that if she found the UNSC soon, she could complete her mission. Now the feeling of pain overtook her, and she fell unconscious from the blood loss. As her hand relaxed, a pair of dog tags fell from it. They were those of her closest friend on Noble Team: Jorge-052.

**Better? I hope so. I took in a lot of the feedback and revamped this, and edited future chapters accordingly.**

** Stuff I changed: almost the entire part aboard the **_**Normandy**_**. People told me it sucked.**

** Stuff I didn't change: The entire scene on Reach, and the beginning of the part on the **_**Normandy**_**. Why? I have my reasons, and they will be explained later.**

** But for now, enjoy my new book!**


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Lazarus

**AN's: Heyyyyy! another rewrite. Special thanks to Eclipse-Luna for the beta, and keep it up! Now, off with your head! Uh... Wait... that's not right. OH, on with the story!**

"_Ms. Lawson. I assume you have gathered the information I asked for?_" The leader of the group known as Cerberus, the Illusive Man, asked.

"I have. The Normandy was dispatched to the Terminus Systems to investigate the disappearances of three ships, whose crews were entirely human. The Council thought it was the Geth. It wasn't."

Miranda Lawson activated her omni-tool, and an image of a large cruiser appeared in front of her.

"This was recovered from the Normandy's flight recorder."

"_That's a Collector ship_."

"It destroyed the Normandy within minutes. Commander Shepard and one other plus about half the Alliance crew were lost in the wreckage."

"_Who __is this one__ other?_"

"Someone that the Normandy had picked up just before they were attacked. I was unable to get a name, as no one knew it."

The image of the Collector ship disappeared and was replaced with that of a much smaller ship. "This is what Shepard's new friend was in before it was destroyed by the Collector Cruiser as well. There were two others, but they were both lost."

"Irrelevant. Have you found Shepard?"

"Yes."

"Good. Find his friend as well."

"We're expanding the Lazarus Project?"

"Yes. A familiar face from the start will ease his tensions about working with us. And begin compiling a possible team for Shepard. Recruit Donnelly and I'm sure Miss Daniels will follow. Also see if you can get the pilot of the original _Normandy_ and Chakwas will hopefully follow. Get Miss Chambers as well, that should be enough to secure him. "

"Yes, sir."

Miranda walked away from the comm pad and sent a message to her contacts. _New priority. Find the other missing person of the Normandy. Bring them to the Lazarus Research Station._

* * *

"With respect, sir, what we are trying to do can't be done." The chief scientist of the Lazarus Project told the Illusive Man.

"_Then find a way to do it._"

"That's just it; there is no way to bring them back to life! They are both clinically brain dead, it would cost a fortune at best."

"_The funds will be given to you and with them, you will bring them back to life_."

"Even I couldn't possibly bring two people who have been dead for three months back to life."

"_Very well. I'm assigning Operative Lawson to handle the Lazarus Project_."

"She couldn't possibly do it if I can't!

"_She will succeed. She always does._"

* * *

"_Have you made any progress on the cybernetic implants, Ms. Lawson_?"

"Shepard has been fully implanted, but his friend is another story. Preliminary scans showed that she has been heavily augmented. I've sent the full details."

"I'm no doctor, Ms. Lawson. Explain this to me."

"The ceramic ossification drugs make her skeleton almost unbreakable, and the muscular protein complex drugs increase her muscle mass astronomically. The retina-inversion stabilizers enhance her vision in any situation, we think that they allow for sharper color perception and near perfect night vision. Finally, the neural disunification drugs improve her reflexes by almost 300%, though we believe that this will increase even more during combat. Put frankly, these make her the perfect soldier."

"_Do what you need to in order to finish the implants_."

"Understood, sir."

* * *

"Sir, we've finished the implants."

"_Good work. How long until they are ready to be woken up_?"

"We don't know for certain, but a good guess would be about 2 months. We still need to restart their organs and get blood flowing again before we can even think about waking them up."

"_Something troubles you_?"

"I would like to study B-312's armor. I've never seen anything like it in the galaxy."

"_I assume you are talking about Shepard's friend_?"

"Yes. We found a set of dog tags in one of the pouches of her armor."

"_No. We need B-312 fully committed to Cerberus. Studying the armor will forge mistrust, and that will make her unwilling to help us. We'll let her decide if she wants to let us_."

"Understood."

* * *

"I_t's been a month since your last report, Ms. Lawson. I assume things are going well_?"

"They are. Skeletal and skin reconstruction is complete, and we are beginning to inject fluids to restart blood flow and internal organs."

"_Good. Notify me when they begin to show neurological activity_."

* * *

"Sir, neurological activity has been noted in Shepard and B-312."

"Excellent work, Ms. Lawson. I have noted your requests to implant both with control chips. Doing so may alter their personalities, and that means failure. And failure is unacceptable."

"But it would mean that we could keep them in par with what we want them to do, we wouldn't have to worry about them betraying us."

"Miranda, this is a tight-nip project and doing anything that means it has a higher chance to fail is not the way I want you to be looking, the answer is no."

"Okay, Sir."

* * *

"Sir, both subjects have achieved full neurological activity. Project Lazarus is a success."

"Excellent work, Ms. Lawson. I'll send a shuttle for them to be taken to a secure Cerberus base for a debriefing."

"Hang on, Sir, I am getting readings of mech activity inside the base."

"Are you under attack?"

"No, but there are mech all over the damn grid lighting up without a warning. Oh no. It's from inside."

"Get those two out of there at all costs, they will have to be woken up early, but I don't think we have a choice."

**That's it! Next up: The Awakening. I must say, writing for the Illusive Man is FUN! I got so into his character; I even started sucking on a pen to simulate him smoking to see if it sounded right! Crazy, huh? As for how Cerberus found out about the augmentations, the scan would have analyzed Six's entire body for any suitable area for implants, and so I assumed that it would pick up the augmentations to her dormant system.**


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Awakening

**With all the other fanfics I'm writing (Though none are posted, except Spartans and this.) I've refined my writing style. Hope that it doesn't confuse anyone.**

**URDNOT WREX!**

Noble Six opened her eyes to the desperate pleas to wake up.

"Come on! Get up! This place is under attack!"

"Uh… What?"

"Something happened. We have to get out of here. Now."

Six heard the sound of weapons discharges in the hallway and her adrenaline kicked in automatically. She jumped up off the bed she was laying on and looked around, searching for two things: her armor and a weapon.

"_There's a pair of pistols in the locker on the far side of the room._"

"Who's that?"

"Don't know. But she's been helping me, so for now I'll trust her."

"Fair enough."

Shepard was at the locker and tossed a pistol to Six.

"There's no ammo."

"_Find some thermal clips. They should be lying around there somewhere._"

Six picked up a red tube that was lying on the ground, she looked for a magazine well in the pistol to insert it into, and finally found one. A satisfying _click_ told her that she had gotten it right.

"_Your armor suits are in the next room, but it's got 3 rogue security mechs inside._"

The pair cautiously walked through the door, pistols up, and immediately dove behind an overturned table to protect them from the mechs. Six brought her pistol up and shot twice, hitting one mech in the leg and severing it. She finished it off with two shots in the head as the other two opened fire again. Shepard popped out of cover and shot another through the head twice, destroying it, and sending a shower of sparks onto the floor. The last one charged at the pair, and Six stood and punched it, knocking its head off of its shoulders.

_Holy shit! _Shepard thought.

The pair retrieved their armor suits, but Six didn't put hers on. When asked by Shepard as to why, her response was: "I can't. Not without spending half an hour on it."

"I'll keep watch. Armor up."

Shepard overturned a nearby table and used it as cover to watch the two doors into the room.

Ten minutes later, Six snapped the last piece on and slipped her helmet on. She had seen that the Package was still attached.

_They must have thought it was a part of my armor_.

She took it off of her back and opened it, removing the data chip, and inserting it into her helmet.

A cool presence filled her head as the AI entered her armor.

"_Hm. So _this_ is what it's like to be in MJOLNIR Armor. Pretty cramped, if you ask me. Oh, sorry. I'm Cortana, an advanced AI._"

"Nice to meet you, Cortana."

"_Wait… I don't recognize this place at all. What happened on Reach? Are we even _on _Reach?" _

"No. And as for what happened, I don't know."

"_My chronological circuits tell me that two standard years have passed since I left Dr. Halsey's care._"

"What?! Two years?! I've been dead for two years?!"

"_You _died_?_"

"Hey! We need to move!" Shepard yelled from across the room.

"_Who's that?_"

"Commander Shepard, with the 'Alliance Navy'. He was commanding the ship that saved us when our Pelican was destroyed."

"_Hm…_"

Six found her old weapons stored in the locker as well, perfectly preserved, save for being modified to support thermal clips and use mass accelerated rounds: An MA37 Assault Rifle, an M45 Tactical Shotgun, an M6G Pistol, and an M7 SMG.

"Do you have enough firepower?" Shepard asked, slightly afraid of the woman.

"Maybe, depends on what I'm fighting." Six shot back.

She placed her shotgun on her back, and her pistol and SMG on her right and left hips.

"Let's go."

"_Six, what happened on that Pelican? And don't lie. I will know._" Cortana asked.

"I'll tell you later. I promise."

The pair moved through the facility, clearing out room after room full of mechs. They entered a large room with two walkways. A lone man was shooting at three mechs with a heavy pistol. Six jumped down next to the man and unloaded with her assault rifle. Shepard helped the two by firing from the doorway at the mechs. When all three mechs were destroyed, Shepard jumped down and joined the pair.

"Wow. Must be bad if Miranda's got you two up and about." The man remarked.

"Who are you?" Shepard asked.

"Name's Jacob Taylor."

"Where's the nearest exit?"

"A shuttle bay, down that way."

Jacob pointed to the doorway to their right.

"More mechs!"

The three dropped behind cover again as a hail of bullets ripped through the air around them. Six slammed another thermal clip into her AR and swapped to her SMG. 60 rounds flew through the air towards the mechs, destroying one and damaging another. Jacob and Shepard unloaded their pistols into the two remaining mechs, but more poured in through the door behind them.

"I'm a biotic, don't worry."

"A what?" Six asked.

"Later."

Jacob threw out a biotic Pull which threw two mechs over the edge of their walkway. Shepard's pistol barked twice, and the last mech fell to the ground, missing its head.

"_Wait… what's that symbol?_"

Cortana was referring to Jacob's uniform. There was a strange symbol on his shirt sleeve, but Six dismissed it, as Cortana would probably find out on her own.

In the next room, there was a console, still active. Shepard activated the video log, and found that it was about him and Six.

"_With respect, sir, what we're trying to do here can't be done." _

"_Then find a way to do it." _

"_That's just it: there is no way to bring them back to life." _

"_Very well, I'm assigning Operative Lawson to handle the Lazarus Project." _

"_Even _she_ couldn't bring two people who have been _dead for three months_ back to life." _

"_She_ will_ succeed. She always does."_

The screen went black.

"That's Wilson, Miranda's assistant. The best scientist here." Jacob informed them.

"I remember a Wilson being there when I woke up once." Shepard said.

"Yeah."

"_Can anyone hear me? Is there anyone left on this channel?_" A voice asked on the comms.

"Wilson, it's Jacob. We just took out a group of mechs over in D-Wing."

"_Get over to the security wing now. I'm pinned down by mechs._"

"We're on our way."

"_Thank God- Wait, did you say we?_" Wilson sounded tense now.

"Yeah. Shepard and B-312 are up."

"_What?! Oh, never mind. Just get over here! Head through the service tunnels."_

"On our way."

"Wait; is that her subject number or something, B-312?" Shepard asked.

"No, Shepard. It's my service tag."

"What do you mean, service tag?"

"I'll explain later. In private. I promise."

"_Six, are you crazy?! How do you know you can trust these people?_" Cortana shouted in Six's ear.

"I don't trust anyone, except Shepard. And I won't even tell him everything. For now."

"_What do you mean 'for now'?_"

"If he proves to be different than my old CO, then I'll tell him everything."

"_You mean from ONI B5D?_"

"Yeah."

"Contacts!" Shepard shouted.

Six dove behind a pipe and shot a mech through the gut, severing one of the major cables connecting the central processor to the legs, and the mech's legs sagged like they were made of jelly. Another shot in the head, and it blew up.

"Wilson, these tunnels are filled with mechs."

"_Yeah, I know, but it's the only way to get to me and the shuttle bay._"

Six dumped the rest of her pistol clip into another mech, and it went down. Concentrated fire by two mechs on her flank brought down her shields, forcing her to fall back into cover.

"Bastards!"

"_You're a supersoldier, not a god, Six._"

"I'll need to modify my shields to compensate."

"_I'll be glad to help you with that. That is, if we get out of here alive._"

"Good point."

Shepard and Jacob were pinned down by three mechs.

"Shepard!"

He looked up to see a shotgun flying through the air at him. He caught and loaded it in one swift motion. The weapon barked and a mech exploded in a shower of sparks. Shepard cocked the shotgun and fired again, blowing the head off of a second, while Jacob dumped his entire Predator pistol clip into the face of the third. The three humans climbed up a service ladder on the other side of the tunnel. At the top, Six reclaimed her shotgun.

"That's a nice weapon."

"I know. That's why I kept it."

"_Will you three hurry up? There are mechs pinning me- OH GOD! I'M HIT!_"

"Wilson! Hang in there, we're coming! Come on, up the stairs and to the right."

Six led the way and burst into the door as soon as it opened, and dropped a mech that was charging at Wilson's downed form. Shepard followed her, unloading his pistol clip into one of the four mechs at the other end of the room. Jacob came last, unleashing a biotic Pull that smashed two of the remaining mechs into the floor. Six swapped to her M6G and blasted the last standing mech into pieces before putting a round into each of the two fallen mech's heads.

"Thank God you found me when you did. If you'd been a second later I'd be- UH!"

"Where were you shot?"

"Left knee. Bastards caught me while I reloaded. There should be some medi-gel in the dispenser on the wall."

"I have a first aid kit right here, save the medi-gel for something more serious." Six said.

She knelt down and inspected the wound.

"_Six, that's not a wound from the mechs; Look here: the shot doesn't drop a hair. If it was shot from as far of a distance as I have calculated, the bullet would have to drop .00012 millimeters._" Cortana informed her.

Six cut the feed to her helmet mic as she worked to patch up Wilson.

"So you're saying he shot himself to fool us?"

"_Yes._"

Six stood up and stared at the man.

"Wait… what are you doing? Help me, goddamnit!"

Six silently grabbed her M6G and slammed another clip into it with cold precision. She pulled it up, leveling the barrel at Wilson's head.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?! I'm a frie~" Wilson began to protest.

"You son-of-a-bitch." Six pulled the trigger.

_BANG!_

Wilson's head snapped back from the impact and he slumped over on the crate he was leaned up against, dead.

"What the fuck?! He was on our side!" Jacob yelled as he ran up behind Six.

Six reenabled her helmet's exterior comms. "He shot himself to fool us. He was a traitor."

"What?! That's impossible! Wilson was one of the most loyal of us!"

"Evidently not."

"Whoa… things are getting intense, here. Shepard, if I tell you who I work for, will you trust me?" Jacob asked.

"I trust you, Jacob."

"Alright… The Lazarus Project that brought you two back to life…"

"What's wrong?"

Jacob took a deep breath. "It's funded and controlled by Cerberus."

**The secret is out! Next up: meeting Miranda, escaping the Lazarus Research Station, and the first meeting between Shepard, Six and the Illusive Man! Then, our heroes are off to the first colony. As for further down, Six will tell Shepard and friends her backstory, as well as a little of the UNSC, after the recruitment of Garrus and Tali. I'm going to have them recruit Tali just after Freedom's Progress, and another quarian will be where Tali is normally recruited, in addition to her 'loyalty mission'.**

**So for now…**

**URDNOT GRUNT! (Second place on my most badass heroes of all-time list.)**


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter 3: Cerberus

**AN's: For those of you who can't figure out what I'm about to say: Jag ska spoa dig! (It's Swedish!) ****This chapter is also unbeta-ed. so excuse the errors. Just one thing: Congrats to all high school seniors out there who graduated, are graduating, or will graduate soon. If I'm early, then consider it an early congrats. If I'm right on time, yay for me for knowing when you graduate, and if I'm late, consider it a belayed congrats. Wanted to get this out before _everyone _graduated, so that I could hopefully hit a few right on the dot. Now then, onward to Richmond! I mean, the next chapter!**

"Cerberus?"

Shepard's brow furrowed, as if he was remembering something.

"I think I met them when I was hunting Saren. Some kind of 'humanity-first' group."

"Yeah. You forgot 'at any cost'." Jacob replied.

"Why hide this?"

"Cerberus has… well; let's just say that we don't have the greatest reputation in the galaxy. We've been labeled as terrorists, and subverts of the Alliance, among other things."

"Okay… someone fill me in here." Six butted in.

"Don't worry; The Illusive Man will explain everything once we get out of here."

"Alright. Let's get to that shuttle."

"Jacob, lead the way." Shepard said.

"Shuttle's right through there." Jacob pointed to a door across the walkway, guarded by five security mechs.

Six racked her shotgun. "Let me handle this."

She calmly walked out into the sights of all five mechs. They all raised their rifles and fired at the Spartan, but her shields held long enough for her to prime a grenade, throw it, and dive behind a crate.

The grenade exploded, taking out the legs of two of the mechs, and disorienting the rest. Six vaulted the crate and blew the head off of one while the rest raised their rifles again.

Spartans were unique. When adrenaline begins to rush throughout a normal person's body, they react quicker. When this happens in a Spartan, the world around them slows down, due to their augmentations. Six had once heard this critical moment in close quarters combat called, "Spartan Time."

The mechs fired point blank at the Spartan, but she ducked just in time, and then swept the legs of the two standing mechs out from under them. She quickly blew the heads off of both, then stomped the other two into the ground.

Shepard and Jacob watched this all from the crates they were behind.

"Damn… I don't think I've ever seen someone move _that_ fast…" Jacob started.

"I have." Shepard said.

"What? Where?"

"On the Citadel. Saren's corpse was controlled by Sovereign. He moved even faster than _her_."

"That's some crazy shit, man."

Tell me about it."

Six turned back to her two teammates, who were practically gawking at her performance. She chuckled a little, and so did Cortana.

"You boys gonna stand there and gawk? Or are we getting out of here?" Six yelled.

Jacob and Shepard snapped out of their conversation and rejoined her.

"What… _are_ you?" Jacob asked.

"Someone you don't want to fuck with."

Six opened the door. On the other side stood a woman.

"There you three are. I've been waiting."

"Miranda. Good to see you're alive." Jacob replied.

Miranda ignored the comment. "Where's that traitor Wilson? I've got a bullet with his name on it."

"I already gave him one." Six replied.

"You did, did you?" Miranda asked.

"He shot himself in the leg to fool us into thinking he was on our side. Too bad he wasn't thorough."

"Good job. Now let's go, my boss wants to speak to you two." She indicated to Six and Shepard.

"You mean the Illusive Man? We know you work for Cerberus."

Miranda seemed unsurprised at Shepard's comment.

"Ah, Jacob. I should have known your conscience would get the better of you."

"Lying to them won't help us convince them to join our cause." Jacob shot back.

"At any rate, it doesn't matter. Let' get going."

"Where exactly?" Shepard asked.

Another Cerberus outpost. The Illusive Man will contact you from there."

"And before you even ask, Shepard, there are no more survivors. This is the evac point, if any survived, they would be here now. So let's go." Miranda continued.

_Shuttle enroute to Cerberus Facility._

"Shepard. Before you meet the Illusive Man, we need to make sure your memories and personality are still the same." Miranda said.

"Come on, Miranda. Now? They've been through a lot, already. Can't these tests wait?" Jacob said.

"No, they can't. We need to know if Shepard is still the same person as before."

"Miranda…"

"It's alright, Jacob." Shepard interrupted.

"Alright then. "Your file says you were a spacer kid, and that you parents were both Alliance Navy." Miranda started.

"I was. It was confusing, constantly moving from one ship to the next, but I pulled through, and enlisted in the Navy at 18."

"Alright then. What about the Skyllian Blitz? Do you remember that?"

"All too well. I was alone, and had to hold my position so that the colony could be evacuated.

"That's tough. I had friends who died in the Blitz. Don't worry, I'm not blaming you." Jacob added.

"How about something more recent. Virmire, The mission to stop Saren's cure for the genophage: Your file says you left Lt. Kaidan Alenko behind to defend a nuclear device on the planet."

"I remember. That was the toughest call I've ever had to make."

"It also says that you had an… altercation with a krogan named 'Urdnot Wrex'."

"He opposed the destruction of that lab. I convinced him that those krogan would be slaves for Saren, and he calmed down."

"That's impressive, Shepard. I've never seen anyone calm down a krogan without putting a bullet in its head. Or sterilizing it." Jacob said.

"How about the Citadel? You chose to save the Council even after they grounded you and prevented you from going after Saren." Miranda asked.

"It didn't matter. I got the Normandy back and stopped Saren; they didn't need to die at the hands of Sovereign and the Geth."

"There. Happy now? His memories are intact, and I can vouch for his combat skills personally." Jacob demanded.

Six had calmly watched the 'tests' and had Cortana building a profile on Commander Shepard.

_He's both a war hero and something of a diplomat. Never thought I'd see that combination._

"Well, since you don't have a recorded history, um…" Miranda started.

"Just call me 'Lieutenant'."

"Alright, Lieutenant. Since we don't have a background on you, we'll just have to hope that you are the same as before."

"I am. Don't worry."

She cut her external mic.

"Cortana? I am still the same, aren't I?"

"_Yes, Lieutenant. Nothing has changed in your neural pathways, although there _is_ something… off about you now_."

"What?"

"_Nothing, it's irrelevant_."

"What is it?"

"_Don't play dumb, Six. You already know._"

_Cerberus facility._

Shepard and Six stepped onto the comm pad, and a scanner field rose up and then went back down. A man, probably in his late 50's, appeared in front of them, sitting in a chair and smoking a cigarette.

"_Commander Shepard. Lieutenant._"

"Illusive Man. I figured we'd be meeting face-to-face." Shepard said.

"_That's a luxury we don't have, given what you and I know_." The Illusive Man replied

"And what exactly do 'we' know?"

"_That Sovereign, Saren, and the Geth were just the beginning of something much larger_."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"_A lot has happened since you disappeared, Shepard. Entire colonies are disappearing. Human colonies._"

"Why just human colonies? And where?"

"_The Terminus Systems. As for why, I can only guess_."

"How are the Reapers involved?"

"_I believe that your destruction of Sovereign got the Reaper's attention, and now they want to draw you and your associates out._"

"It worked."

"_And now they want to make sure that there are no more like you out there, Shepard._"

"Where does Cerberus get involved? This is an Alliance matter."

"They don't have the strength to send any ships out. After Sovereign's defeat, The Alliance fleets were decimated. They're more focused on colonies closer to Earth and the Citadel now. Cerberus is the only group who can investigate."

"Alright. Where do we start?"

"_Go to Freedom's Progress, that's the most recent colony to be hit. Find out what you can, Shepard_. _Good luck._"

"What about a team?" Six asked.

"_Jacob and Miranda will accompany you."_

"Jacob's just a gun for hire, and Miranda's liable to shoot us in the back." Shepard retorted.

"_Jacob has never fully trusted me, but at least he's open about it. And Miranda is my most trusted officer. They'll follow you, Shepard."_

"_One other thing. Lieutenant, we've outfitted your armor with an omni-tool, since it didn't have one before. It's on your left arm._"

Six lifted her arm, and her entire forearm was enveloped in an orange holo-computer.

"So that's why my TAC-COM is missing."

"_Good luck to both of you._"

The link cut, and Shepard and Six left the comm room and headed back up to the shuttle bay.


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Progress

_Cerberus shuttle enroute to Freedom's Progress._

Shepard, Six, Miranda and Jacob sat in the shuttle, double checking their weapons and equipment.

Six was familiarizing herself with her omni-tool and its functions.

"_No bugs anymore, Lieutenant._" Cortana reported.

"Then integrate, if you can."

"_On it._"

Her omni-tool flashed blue, and then returned to its normal orange color.

"_Interesting. This houses an onboard computer, hacking tool, and numerous other hardware and software components, all tailored to infiltration. Hmm…_"

"What?"

"_This has the ability to launch a bolt of… fire, for lack of a better term, and can also hack synthetics and computers._"

"Anything else?"

"_Actually, yes. There's a built in communicator, as well as a cloaking device._"

"This thing has Active Camouflage? Like the Elites?"

"_Yes, but it's different. You can move as fast and as sudden as you want, but any gunfire or other extreme uses of the tool overtax the system, cancelling the cloak_."

"You're in command now, Shepard. What's our objective here?" Miranda asked.

"Our first priority is to look for survivors."

"Unlikely, Commander. The other colonies we went to were all deserted. But there is a possibility, since we're the first to arrive. Normally, the Turians or Asari get there first." Jacob said.

The shuttle touched down, and the four jumped out, Shepard's M-92 Mantis Sniper Rifle scanning the streets around them.

"Clear. Let's move."

The team moved into a diner, with everything seemingly the way it was, except that it was missing the people that would have normally been in the building.

"Looks like everyone just got up and left." Jacob commented.

Outside, they heard mechanical whirring, and dove behind cover as a group of mechs opened fire on them.

"Damnit! Lieutenant, flank them, we'll cover you."

"Got it."

Six rolled from her spot behind a reinforced steel guardrail that covered the entire side of the walkway, and dropped two of the mechs before being forced to retreat as a pair of dog-like mechs charged at her.

"Fuck you, Fido!" Six yelled.

She unloaded on the two mechs, disabling and destroying them, while Shepard picked off a mech on a far ledge, and Miranda and Jacob used their biotics to blow up the other two mechs.

"That shouldn't have happened. At every other colony, the mechs were disabled." Miranda said.

"And besides, they should have recognized us as humans." Jacob added.

"Maybe they didn't recognize the Lieutenant, and assumed that we were smuggling her in." Shepard added.

"That doesn't warrant opening fire on us." Miranda argued.

"It doesn't matter. Let's just keep going." Six cut in.

They kept walking and fighting until they came to a locked door.

"I got it." Six said as she stepped forward.

She brought up her omni-tool and unlocked the door. It opened, revealing three humanoids with rifles aimed at the door. They were wearing environment suits, which made no sense to Six, as the air was perfectly breathable.

_Wait a minute… Quarians! Of course!_ She had been reading about the different alien races during the shuttle ride to Freedom's Progress.

She instinctively raised her MA37 at the Quarians, especially quickly because they were aliens. Fighting aliens your entire life, you developed the mindset that anything that wasn't human was an enemy.

"Get back, Cerberus scum!" One of the Quarians, a male shouted.

"Stand down! Prazza, you agreed to let me do the talking!"

Another Quarian, a female, judging by her voice, stepped out from behind the three males with rifles.

Shepard's rifle dropped to the floor.

"Tali?"

"Shepard. What… I… How…?"

Six may have been a Spartan, trained to kill and nothing more, but she knew from firsthand experience that Shepard and this "Tali" were close, probably more than close. She dropped her rifle to her chest.

Tali slowly walked up to Shepard.

"Is it really you?"

"It's me. I gave you that data on the Geth while we were chasing Saren, remember?"

"Oh, Keelah… It _is_ you."

Tali hugged Shepard for the first time in two years. Miranda took a step forward, and was promptly yanked back by Six.

"They've been apart for two years. She thought Shepard was _dead_. Let them have their moment. They've earned it." Six whispered in the Cerberus Officer's ear.

Six let go of Miranda's shirt collar, and they both relaxed a bit more.

"When I heard that the _Normandy_ was destroyed, I feared the worst… then I saw Joker on the Citadel, drinking himself to death. I asked him what had happened, and he said that you and her," Tali indicated to Six. "got spaced after saving him. He cried a little, said that it was his fault that you both died."

"Now, I'm hearing that you're working for Cerberus." She continued.

"We're not working for them. They brought us back, Tali. Now they're helping us find out what happened to colonies like this one." Shepard answered.

"But _Cerberus_? You're better than this, Shepard."

"They're the only ones who will help. Entire human colonies are disappearing, and the Reapers are connected. Somehow, someway, they are. That's why the _Normandy_ was destroyed: They recognized that our crew was a threat to them, and indoctrinated another race to do their dirty work."

"I just find it a little hard to believe that Cerberus are the only ones who will do anything."

Shepard muttered something to Tali that no one but Six, with her enhanced hearing, picked up on.

"I fully expect them to double cross us, and I'm preparing for that, but for now, I have to work with them."

"So why are you here?" Shepard asked at his normal volume.

"We're trying to find one of our own, Veetor. He was on Pilgrimage here when the colony went dark."

"And we don't appreciate Cerberus scum getting in our way!" The lead male, presumably Prazza, added.

"What are the Quarian's problems with Cerberus?" Shepard asked.

"You should already know, scum!" Prazza answered.

"Commander Shepard is not 'scum'!" Tali yelled.

"Commander Shepard, eh? You had a good deal of respect in the Migrant Fleet, and the rest of the galaxy, before you joined Cerberus." Prazza backed off a little.

"Anyway, to answer your question; Cerberus planted a bomb on one of our ships." Tali explained.

"A bomb?" Shepard turned to Miranda. "Did you know about this?"

"Of course. It was necessary." She responded calmly.

"Planting a bomb on a civilian ship is never 'necessary'." Shepard shot back.

"Hey, guys." Six interrupted. "Since we're trying to find out what happened here, why don't we help you find Veetor? We can ask him what happened while we're at it."

Six couldn't see it, but she knew that Prazza was glaring at her under his helmet at her suggestion. She glared right back, even though he couldn't see it.

"Good idea, Lieutenant. If it's okay with you." Shepard said to Tali.

"It's not my call."

"We'll let you help, but if anything happens to him when we find him, it's on you." Prazza said.

"We'll split up. Cover more ground faster."

Shepard grabbed his rifle, and the two groups went their separate ways, with the Quarians taking to the taller buildings of the colony, and the humans taking the streets.

"_Shepard, mechs up ahead._" Tali informed them.

"Got it."

A trio of flying mechs zipped past the four humans, and the squad moved into an adjacent building, where a lone mech was huddled in a sleep mode in one of the corners. Six walked up and ripped its head off, sending a shower of sparks that agitated her shields.

Outside, the three flyers came back, two using standard mass accelerator weapons, and one launching small rockets. Six activated her omni-tool's Overload function, and the rocket drone went down, only to be replaced by another mere seconds later. She tried to use it again, but nothing happened.

"What the fuck?"

"_A second use in that short of a timeframe would fry the onboard computer, and destroy the omni-tool._" Cortana told her.

"You couldn't tell me this _before_?"

"_Actually, no, I couldn't._"

"Fuck this."

Six pulled out her M7 SMG and activated one of her omni-tool's ammo upgrades, called Disruptor Ammo. Excellent against shields and synthetics, like drones. She dumped half the clip into one, missing about ½ of the time, but still destroying it, and another standard drone replaced it as well.

"_Your Overload function can be used again, Lieutenant._" Cortana informed her.

"Can you give me a visual representation so that you don't have to tell me every time?"

"_Of course. Here you go. The circle will fill with white, indicating the approximate time until you can use your abilities again._"

"Thanks."

Six triggered the Overload power again, and the last drone went down in a shower of sparks. Six briefly checked her armor integrity; Her shields had nearly dropped in the eight seconds she had popped her head up.

_Really have to fix that._

"_Shepard, Prazza took his men ahead, despite my protests. He doesn't want you to have any chance of getting to Veetor._" Tali informed them.

"Typical Quarians." Miranda commented.

Shepard ignored her. "Where are they now?"

"_In a loading bay just ahead of you, getting slaughtered by a gigantic mech. Veetor must have reprogrammed them to defend him._"

"What would make him do that?"

"_He was always nervous, but his suit must have been punctured. The infection probably drove him paranoid, making him reprogram the mechs_. _If you get your squad to cover the door, I'll open it from here._"

"Got it, Tali."

"Miranda, Jacob: I want you on either side of that door. The Lieutenant and I will take cover behind those crates." He pointed to two wide crates that were in full view of the loading bay door.

"On it, Commander." Miranda and Jacob slid up to the left and right sides of the door, respectively, and Six and Shepard crouched behind the crates.

"Tali, we're in position."

"_Alright. Opening the door… now._"

The large bay doors opened, revealing a large mech crushing the last Quarian rifleman beneath its large foot.

"Terrible way to go." Six commented.

Shepard vaulted the crate he was crouching behind.

"Let's move!"

Jacob and Miranda turned and sprinted for the nearest pieces of cover, with Shepard and Six right behind them.

"That thing has shields _and _armor on top if its hull." Miranda told them.

"Let's take it down a notch. Miranda, double Overload! Let's bring its shields down." Six shouted.

Two omni-tools flared, and the YMIR mech's shields fell to about 5% strength.

Jacob let loose with his M8 Avenger Assault Rifle, dropping the mech's shields and damaging its armor, before having his cover obliterated by a grenade from the mechs launcher. It then turned to Six, who was sprinting to a better spot of cover, and launched another grenade right at her.

The grenade detonated right where she had been standing not ¼ second before, still imparting enough force to drop the Lieutenant's shields and launch her into the air.

"Lieutenant!" Shepard shouted.

No response. Six was out cold and vulnerable, lying in the open.

"Jacob, get her to safety! Now!"

Jacob took off towards Six, while Miranda hit the YMIR with an Overload, dropping the mech's armor to about 12% integrity. Concentrated fire, and a few well-placed grenades, whittled down the mech's armor, and distracted it while Jacob dragged Six behind a crate.

"_She's safe, Commander_. _But she's gonna need medical attention, she's hurt_."

"_Like hell I am!_" She said, coughing.

Six appeared behind the crate and let loose an Incinerate ability, which burned through the mech's central processor, finishing it off.

Shepard and Miranda rushed to Six as she was forced to sit down on the crate by Jacob. From the front, she looked fine, but her back was where the real effects became apparent: Her normally maroon and dark green armor was now scored with black scorch marks, though luckily what appeared to be the armor's power plant was undamaged. A shimmer along the armor's surface indicated that her shields still functioned.

"I'm fine, Shepard. I've faced worse."

"No, you're not fine. And for future reference, don't go running out into the sights of a YMIR mech."

"No shit. Sir."

Six stood up, and her left leg gave slightly.

"Damn… must have torn one of the tendons in the blast."

"Are you okay to keep going?"

Six grunted as she limped beside them. "Yeah. Just gotta not move around so fast until I get this fixed."

"Come on, let's find Veetor, and figure out what happened here."

They walked up a ramp to a locked door, which Shepard hacked. As the door opened, Tali joined them. She gasped at Six's blackened armor.

"Keelah… What happened to you?"

"I took a grenade in the back, courtesy of that bastard over there." Six said, pointing at the mech.

Inside, another Quarian, Veetor, sat in a chair facing a screen divided into 6 camera feeds.

"Are you Veetor?" Shepard asked.

No response. The Quarian just kept staring at the screens.

Shepard activated his omni-tool, and the screens went black.

"Huh? What?"

Veetor bolted up from the chair and turned to the group.

"Humans? How… how did you survive?"

"We didn't. We just arrived here." Shepard answered.

"They took everyone. I hid, but they'll be back for me."

"Who?"

Veetor reactivated the camera screens, revealing an insect-like humanoid watching as pods were carried past it.

"My god… I think that's a Collector." Miranda said.

"What's a Collector?"

"A mysterious race that lives beyond the Omega-4 Relay. They only come through to trade for… unusual things."

"Like what?"

"Groups of individuals with genetic abnormalities."

"Could fit the bill: mysterious, secluded race that only travels to known space for limited amounts of time. Perfect fit for the Reapers to control." Six commented.

"Just what I was thinking." Shepard turned back to Veetor.

"And the humans here just gave up?"

"No. Seeker swarms. They sting you, and they paralyze you. Then they come and take you away."

"Shepard, he needs medical attention. We can get his omni-tool data, and Tali can take him back to the Migrant Fleet." Six said.

"No. We need the Quarian for his eyewitness accounts." Miranda argued.

"Veetor is unstable! He needs medical attention, not an interrogation!" Tali shot back.

"They're right, Miranda. Tali, send us the data, and take Veetor back to your Fleet." Shepard said.

"I will. And thank you. I'm glad you're still the one giving orders."

"You're welcome to come with us when you finish there, Tali."

"Let's discuss this again _after_ Veetor gets back to the Fleet."

"Alright."

The humans helped Tali and Veetor to the Quarian's shuttle, then started back to their own.

"Hang on, Commander. I want to get some data on the YMIR's shields and armor." Six said

"For what?"

"To improve our own."

"Fair enough."

Six headed back to the disabled mech and swept her omni-tool over the exposed shield generator and armor plating. After she had ripped the necessary data from the generator and plating, she and the others walked back to the shuttle and left the abandoned colony.

Six cut her helmet's external mic.

"Did you have to take all of those credits from the safes? I know you did."

"_Thought they'd come in handy later on._" Cortana replied.

"That's _theft_. For an AI, you sure don't know much about the law."

"_I never needed to know, although I do have all UNSC regulations and codes of conduct stored in my memory._"

"Guess those are all useless here.

"_Pretty much._"

"So, how much _did _you take?"

"_Concerned now, Lieutenant?_"

"What's done is done, Cortana."

"_In that case, about 13,000."_

"Wow."

"_Considering using it?_"

"Sadly, yes."

"_For what_?"

"You'll see."


	6. Chapter 5

Chapter 5: Normandy; Part 1

_Cerberus Facility._

Shepard and Six stepped onto the comm pad and established a link to the Illusive Man.

_"Shepard, Lieutenant, good work on Freedom's Progress. I've received the data from the Quarians, and though it would have been better to have the Quarian, Veetor, himself, this is _your_ mission, and thus it's your choice._"

"_The data itself is nothing new, but it does confirm my suspicions about the Collectors._" He continued.

"You knew about them? Why didn't you tell us?" Shepard demanded.

"_It was just a theory until now. And I've had suspicions for two years, ever since someone destroyed the original _Normandy."

"Then we need to take the fight to them, through the Omega-4 Relay." Six said.

"_That's the problem, Lieutenant. No ship, except for the Collectors own ships, has ever gone through the relay and come back. If you go through now, you could all die. And _that _I am certain of._"

"Then how can we go through and still come back?"

"_Let me handle that. For now, Shepard. I'm sending you some dossiers of possible recruits for your team. You can't do this with just those you have now._"

"Keep them. I had a team. And a loyal one at that."

"_It's been two years, Shepard._"

"What do you know about Garrus Vakarian?"

"_After the battle with Sovereign, he rejoined C-Sec for a while, but later vanished. Even _I_ don't know where he is._"

"What about Liara T'Soni?"

"_She became an information broker. There are rumors that she's working with the Shadow Broker, and if they're true, then she's bad news._"

"What about Ashley Williams?"

"_She's still with the Alliance, but she's on a classified assignment, so I can't give you a location._"

"How about Urdnot Wrex?"

"_He went back to Tuchanka after the Battle with Sovereign, and he hasn't been seen offworld _

"Alright, I get it. Send me the dossiers."

"_I already have. Before you do anything, head to Omega. There's a Salarian doctor there named Mordin Solus, he runs a clinic. He'll be vital in researching a resistance to the seeker swarms._"

"I'll check it out. But I need a ship to get around."

"_I've already taken care of that. And I found you a pilot. I hear he's one of the best._ _Good luck, both of you._"

The link ended as the door behind the two opened, and in stepped the pilot of the late SSV _Normandy _SR-1.

"Joker!"

"Hey, Commander. Long time, no see, eh?"

Shepard and Joker shook hands, and then Joker extended his hand to Six.

"I still don't know who you are, but it's good to see you again, too."

Six shook his hand. "You too, Joker. Just call me 'Lieutenant' for now."

"Wow, somebody's got no life but the military."

"What made you sign up with Cerberus?" Shepard asked.

"The Alliance grounded me after the _Normandy_ was destroyed. They took away the one thing that still mattered to me: flying, so hell yeah, I joined Cerberus."

"I hear you ran into Tali on the Citadel."

"Yeah. She found me a week after the _Normandy_ was lost, drinking like I had no tomorrow. She's pretty shook up about it, too. You better get in contact with her, and soon."

"I already did. We met her on Freedom's Progress yesterday. That's where I heard about you."

"Oh."

The three made their way back to the main floor of the facility, with Shepard and Joker catching up and Six walking in silence.

"One last reason I joined up…" Joker started.

The viewport expanded, revealing a ship in the drydock.

"They only told me last night."

The ship was identical to the _Normandy_ SR-1, except that it was twice as big, had "SR-2" on the sides, and was painted white and grey with the Cerberus insignia plastered on it.

"Feels like a homecoming, Commander." Joker remarked.

"Yeah. We'll have to give it a name."

_Deck 2: CIC, Normandy SR-2._

Shepard, Six, Miranda, and Jacob all walked through the airlock on the new _Normandy_. To Shepard, it wasn't the same as the SR-1, though it was at least similar. It was too big. He was used to being able to go down a stairwell and be on the crew deck, then a quick trip in the elevator to the shuttle bay. He dismissed those complaints. Now, he had to get acquainted to his new ship.

"We should probably head back to our stations, Commander." Miranda told him.

"Is there an armory here? I'm quite the arms maker." Six asked.

"You can just follow me, Lieutenant." Jacob told her.

"Alright, then."

Six and Jacob walked off, and Miranda directed Shepard to the galaxy map and his private terminal to the left of it.

Shepard accessed the terminal and saw that he had 3 messages. The first was from Councilor David Anderson, who had been Shepard's CO before Shepard became a Spectre.

_Shepard,_

_ On the off chance that the rumors are true, and you are alive, I need you to come to the Citadel. The Council wants you to explain a few things. I can't say anything more, not on such an open channel._

_ Anderson._

The second message was from Tali.

_Shepard,_

_ I got Veetor back to the Fleet, and he's being treated. I got a proper leave from my ship to come with you. Just swing by the Migrant Fleet and I'll join you._

_ Tali._

The final message was from the Admiral of the Alliance Fifth Fleet, Steven Hackett.

_Shepard,_

_ Thought I'd pass this along to you, since I know it means a lot to you. Alliance teams have found the wreckage of the _Normandy_ SR-1 on Alchera, in the Omega Nebula. I'd like you to go to it, seeing as you were the last commander of the ship, although there is an ulterior motive here: I want you to place a memorial at the site, and recover the dog tags of some of the personnel that were lost with the SR-1._

_ Adm. Hackett._

There were also dossiers from the Illusive Man, detailing three people that Shepard could recruit. The first was someone called 'Archangel'.

'_Archangel'_

_ -Small-unit tactical expertise_

_ -Omni-tool expert and noted sniper_

_ Archangel is a mercenary commander whose operations are noted for their technical expertise and strategic brilliance. He is responsible for high-profile attacks on gang leaders on Omega and can likely be found there._

The next was, interestingly, a krogan warlord.

_The Warlord_

_Dr. Okeer_

_ -Millennia of combat and strategic experience_

_ -Rumored familiarity with Collector technology_

_ A brilliant and brutal krogan warlord who fought in the Krogan Rebellions, Dr. Okeer has become obsessed with saving the krogan people from the genophage and is believed to have contacted the Collectors in an attempt to gain technology to that end. He is currently in a Blue Suns camp on Korlus, though his affiliation with the mercenary group is currently unknown._

Finally, there was Mordin, the Salarian doctor. Shepard skipped over his dossier, as he already knew enough about him.

First, he was going to find the Migrant Fleet and get Tali, then to the Citadel to talk to the Council, and maybe get his Spectre status reinstated.

"Joker, any idea where the Quarian Migrant Fleet is?"

A monotone female voice came over the intercom.

"_The Migrant Fleet is stationed in the Far Rim, Commander_."

"Who are you?"

"_That's the ship's AI, EDI_." Joker answered.

"I don't like that idea."

"_I am limited in function by the protocols Cerberus has given me. During combat, I operate the cyberwarfare and electronic warfare suites. Outside of combat, I merely offer advice and monitor the ship_."

"Alright. Plot a course to the Far Rim."

"_Commander, there's a problem brewing in the armory between the Lieutenant and Miranda. You better get there fast, or Miranda may lose a leg_." Joker said.

"On my way."

Shepard ran to the armory, and found Six, wielding some kind of blue sword in one hand and her combat knife in the other, squaring off against Miranda, who was calm and collected, but had her biotics ready just in case.

"You had no right to try and go through my files!" Six yelled.

"The Illusive Man needs information to start forming a personnel file on you."

"Get this straight, bitch: I. Don't. Work. For. Cerberus. I take orders from one person: Shepard. That's it! Not your Illusive Man, not Cerberus' commanding body, and sure as _hell_ not from you!"

"ENOUGH! Both of you!" Shepard interrupted. "What is going on here?"

"I found her trying to hack my omni-tool, trying to access my files without my knowing." Six said.

"I needed the information for the Illusive Man in order to start forming a file on her."

"Miranda; if she doesn't want to tell you anything, then she won't. And she's right: she doesn't work for Cerberus. We're working _with_ them, so she doesn't need to tell you anything."

"And Lieutenant, her trying to hack your files doesn't necessitate the need to use… whatever _that_ is. You could have discouraged her with a little less of a death threat."

"Like what?" Six said, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she was speaking to her Commanding Officer.

"A loaded gun really changes your enemy's outlook." Jacob said from his hiding spot behind one of the worktables.

Six took a deep breath behind her helmet.

"Alright." Her head whipped around to Miranda.

"If you ever try anything like that again, I will shove my rifle down your throat and pull the trigger until the firing pin _clicks_." She said with the straightest voice Shepard had ever seen in a threat.

Miranda walked out, and Six returned to her previous project.

"Why didn't you want her going through your files? Surely she can find them elsewhere?" Shepard asked Six.

"No, she can't." Six stated calmly.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm sorry, Commander. I have issues talking about my past to people I don't fully trust. I always have. It's complicated. Maybe I'll tell you two later."

"No offense to you, Jacob, but, Lieutenant, you trust him? He works for Cerberus too."

"I know, but he's not the gung-ho Cerberus type like _Miranda_ is."

She said 'Miranda' with such spite that Shepard doubted that he would ever be able to have the two of them in the same squad at the same time.

"Hell, Jacob, you only care that Cerberus let you back on the front lines, don't you?" She continued.

"No… that's most of it. I don't trust the Illusive Man, but I'll at least be open about it." Jacob answered, returning to his station.

"Exactly."

Shepard left, and Six returned to her project, a rifle using superconducting magnets to hyperaccelerate a 10mm slug to near light speed.

"It was used extensively long before my time, but the plans remain intact. It was abandoned because it costs too much money to produce, but here, I can make one. This thing is the ultimate sniper rifle. Nothing can outmatch it. I just need three pairs of superconducting magnets." She told Jacob.

"So no eezo and no thermal clips?"

"That's the beauty of it. Since it doesn't use thermal clips, eezo, or mass accelerators, it will penetrate a good many kinetic barriers. Maybe even multiple enemies."

"What's the catch?"

"Small clips, no ammo prevalence, and it kicks like a mule."

"Where did you get the plans for this?"

"I had them stored in the armor's memory banks."

"Are there any other weapons you can make?"

"Plenty."

"Like that sword?"

"No. I picked that up before the SR-1 was destroyed."

"That could have been pretty useful against that YMIR."

Six chuckled a bit. "Too bad I forgot about it."

"You forgot?" How?"

"It's been two years since I got it, and I didn't exactly have time to inventory."

Jacob took a deep breath. "So why do you _really_ trust me? It's obvious you BS'd Shepard."

She sighed before explaining.

"You remind me a lot of one of my former teammates, both in looks and in personality."

"Were you two close?"

"Yeah… More than close."

"I didn't mean to bring up bad memories."

"No… it's fine. I needed to talk about it a bit."

"My father went missing ten years ago on a private ship."

"I'm so sorry."

"Looks like we both needed to get something off our chests."

"Yeah."

Six went back to her work, and felt better after talking to Jacob. He really did remind Six of Don. Both were dark-skinned and average height, and while not natural leaders, they both could take charge if they needed to, although Donnell already had.

"_Are you developing feelings for Mr. Taylor?_" Cortana asked.

Six cut the external mic.

"I don't know. Maybe. He's just the absolute double of Donnell."

"_SPARTAN B-015?_ _I know you two were close._"

"How do you know so much about me? Have you been hacking into my brain or something?"

"_That's impossible to do. I have every Spartan's CSV and personal files. I needed them when Dr. Halsey had me choose a courier._"

"Why?"

"_I had to find a Spartan whose neural patterns were in sync with my own. It was a choice between you and Spartan-117._"

"The Master Chief?"

"_Yes._"

"Why choose me over a II?"

"_You were the more interesting of you two. Not only were your neural patterns in better sync, but I wanted to find out more about you without hacking the most secure network in the UNSC._"

"Thanks for that."

Six returned to her work again, and began to assemble the Gauss Rifle on a computer.

_Really wish we had holograms that could be manipulated. I'll have to find out._

Six walked into the empty tech labs across the hall and accessed the terminal on the far wall. She found plans for a prototype hologram that could be manipulated, but she couldn't request a requisition; only Shepard and Miranda could.

_Figures. That bitch restricted my access to requisitions. _

"Cortana, when were the requisition permissions changed?"

"_Accessing… just a few minutes ago."_

"Figures. This must be Miranda's petty revenge."

"_I can override it for a few seconds if you want._"

"No. I'll just ask Shepard to put in requisition."

"_For what?_"

"The prototype holograms."

"_Six, those things cost almost 300,000 credits._"

"That's a problem."

"_Need me to hack more safes?_"

"I don't know. With the Cerberus funding we're getting, I may be able to just put in the requisition in a few days."

"_Shepard won't like this._"

"If it helps me improve our weapons, then he'll approve."

"_Maybe. Would you like me to construct a message?_"

"No. I'll just ask him myself."

Six walked into the briefing room, followed closely by Jacob and, at a greater distance, Miranda.

Shepard stood at the briefing console, with a map of a space station on the terminal in front of him.

Tali walked in soon after. Shepard had visited the Migrant Fleet just a few days before, and Tali had left her ship to join them. Six had mostly stayed in the armory during her time on the Normandy, but she assumed that Tali and Shepard had 'caught up'. (**if you catch my drift**.)

Shepard had also visited the Citadel, and while he had been reinstated as a Spectre, he had been asked to restrict his operations to the Terminus Systems, due to his affiliation with Cerberus. He had also introduced Six to the first human Councilor, Captain David Anderson, Shepard's former CO. Six already respected the man. He was someone who would put defense of _all_ species above that of just humanity, and _that_ was what the Council needed.

Six had been given a 'tour' of the Citadel, and had picked up that hologram that she needed. She had put it to good use, and had modified it with Cortana's help, giving it a representation of her weapon's weight and kickback, even in a holographic state, and had begun actual construction of the weapon.

"We're heading to Omega to find two possible recruits for our team, a mercenary named Archangel, and a Salarian doctor named Mordin Solus."

"We could split into two teams to get to both simultaneously." Six suggested.

"Good idea. Miranda and I will find Dr. Solus. You take Jacob and Tali and find Archangel."

"Any intel on where they may be?" Jacob asked.

"Solus runs a clinic on Omega in a quarantine zone, and the mercenary gangs are uniting against Archangel, so you can start there."

"_We're nearing Omega. ETA: 30 minutes._" Joker announced over the intercom.

"Got it, Joker. Crew dismissed." Shepard announced.

The five of them left and went to prep their gear, and Six finished assembling the Gauss Rifle, and then toggled the intercom.

"Commander, I have something you should see down in the armory."

"_On my way_."

Shepard walked in a minute later.

"What is it?"

Six picked up the Gauss Rifle off of the table. "This is a Gauss Rifle. It uses electromagnets to hyperaccelerate a 10mm solid slug to nearly the speed of light."

"This is what you've been working on?"

"Yeah. Definitely worth losing a week's worth of sleep over."

"A week? That's not healthy."

"Commander, you'll find out pretty quickly that I can operate effectively on a minimal amount of sleep."

"Still, you're part of my crew, and you need to be at 100%."

"I'll sleep when the Collectors are dead."

"You should get some rest when we get back from Omega, that's an order."

"I… Alright." She began to protest, but cut herself off.

"Anyway, this is one hell of a sniper rifle, and I think you would get the best use out of it." Six continued.

"Any important details I should know about?"

"I couldn't modify it to use thermal clips, due to the bulk of the magnets, so ammo is virtually nonexistent, and it only holds four rounds in a clip, so use it sparingly. I was able to get ahold of enough metal to make about 6 clips worth. Other than that, it kicks like a mule, and can break through just about any kinetic barrier. I'll wager it can punch a hole in a light corvette's shields, but its main role is anti-infantry. Just be careful what you're shooting at. This thing _will_ overpenetrate and hit the guy behind the person standing behind your target."

"Damn. Where did you get the plans for this?"

"I had them stored in the armor's memory banks, along with a few other blueprints."

"Thanks for this, Lieutenant, but you'd better assemble your own gear. You've got the nastier mission."

"Sure thing, Commander."

Six snapped a crisp salute, and walked over to the weapon locker as Shepard left. She pulled out her shotgun and SMG, then holstered her Magnum and slung her AR over her shoulder.

"Do you have enough firepower?" Jacob asked as he grabbed his M8 Avenger Assault Rifle and M23 Katana Shotgun.

"We're going up against God knows how many mercs and other unknowns. I _need _this much firepower." Six replied.

"Good point."

Jacob and Six walked to the airlock, being joined shortly thereafter by Tali, Shepard, and lastly Miranda.

The squad cycled through, and walked out onto Omega.


	7. Chapter 6

Chapter 6: Omega

**Hey peeps! I have decided to make this into a trilogy, with this book covering ME2, the second covering ME3, and the third covering something special I have planned for after ME3.**

Shepard was the first out of the airlock. He and his team were 'greeted' by three armed thugs. Six's pistol came up, and was met by three Assault Rifles.

"We're not here to fight, Lieutenant. Holster it." Shepard said.

"Fine, but the safety stays off."

Six put her pistol back in its holster and the guards lowered their weapons as well.

"Aria T'Loak wants to see you." The lead thug said.

"Why should I go?" Shepard rebuked.

"People come to Omega with questions. Aria can answer most of them. And a dead Spectre must have plenty of questions."

"Alright. Where can I find Aria?"

"Afterlife."

The three guards left, and Shepard and his team went to the place labeled on their omni-tools as Afterlife.

It was a nightclub, essentially.

"Wrex was right." Shepard commented.

"Who?" Six asked.

"He's a krogan battlemaster, basically a biotic krogan."

"Wonderful."

"He once said: 'Seems like no matter where you go there are always Asari shaking their asses."

"Just be happy Liara isn't here now. She'd kill you." Tali said.

"Probably."

They made their way up to the upper bar and found themselves facing three more armed guards, standing in front of an Asari. The one closest to Shepard pulled out a datapad and began moving it across his body.

"If you're checking for weapons, you're not doing a very good job." Shepard commented, pulling out his M-3 Predator pistol.

"Just making sure it's you. It could be anyone wearing your skin." the Asari replied.

He put the datapad away.

"You're clear, Commander. Just don't cause any trouble."

The guards retired to the lower platform, and the Asari, presumably Aria, invited Shepard to sit on the opposite side of the seats from her.

"So what brings a dead Spectre to Omega?"

"I need information. I'm building a team to stop the Collectors from abducting human colonies."

"Right to business. I like that."

"I need to find a Salarian named Mordin Solus."

"The doctor? He runs a clinic in the quarantine zone. He's friendly. Just don't get him started. He'll talk your ear off."

"What about the mercenary called 'Archangel'?"

"You gotta be crazy to go after him. Best way would be to sign up as a freelance merc, but they won't like it when they find out that you're not there to kill him."

"We'll handle it. Thanks for the info."

"No problem. Just remember the golden rule: Don't. Fuck. With. Aria."

Shepard stood and rejoined his team.

"Where are we headed, Shepard?" Miranda asked.

"We're going to the quarantine zone. Solus runs a clinic there."

"What about us?" Six asked.

"You'll be signing up as freelance mercs as a cover to get to Archangel. Just don't blow your cover until you get to him."

"Got it, Commander. Good luck." Six said as she, Jacob and Tali left.

"You too."

Six, Jacob and Tali walked into the mercenary recruiting center located just below the Upper Bar. She approached a Batarian that was typing in a computer.

"Is this the place to go after Archangel?"

"Yes. We've got him pinned down in the warehouse district."

"Where do we sign up?"

"Right here. You get paid when the job is done, and if you die, your friends do not get your pay. And no, this does not equal membership in the Blue Suns, Blood Pack or Eclipse groups. You are freelancers only, got it?"

"Got it."

"Good. Head to the landing area. There's a shuttle waiting for the next batch."

As the three walked out, a young human, couldn't have been more than 16 or 17, walked in.

"I'm going after Archangel!"

"You sure you're old enough, kid?" Six asked him.

"Hey, I can handle a gun! I just got this pistol for 50 credits." He pulled out an M6 Shuriken SMG. Six took a half-second to study it, and knew that it was a dud.

She grabbed it from the kid and popped the thermal clip out. It sparked and jammed.

"Hey! What the hell?!"

She handed it back.

"Go get your money back." And with that, Six left, followed closely by Jacob and Tali.

"So the cold-blooded soldier _does_ have a heart." Jacob commented.

"I've seen enough kids get killed in my day. If I can save one, it'll make me feel better."

"That's precious."

"Yeah. But we've got mercs to kill."

"And… Preciousness gone."

The walk to the landing area was filled with the clicks of the team checking their weapons.

"You're like your own personal army." Tali commented upon seeing the full extent of Six' loadout.

"I like to think that sometimes. Then… well, I'll tell you later."

They found the shuttle, and the Batarian pilot waiting for them.

"You're going after Archangel?"

"Yeah." Six answered.

"Good. You'll get your instructions when we get there."

The four got in the shuttle and left for the warehouse district.

The shuttle landed in the warehouse district, and the three were brought up to speed by another Batarian.

"We've got Archangel pinned down in one of the building north of here. You three will be part of a diversion team. Once the signal is given, you and the other freelancers will distract him while our infiltration team sneaks in and gets him. Any questions?"

"What if the infiltration team fails?" Six asked.

"Then we send in the heavy mech and gunship. But we probably won't need to. He's getting tired, making mistakes. We'll get him."

"Got it."

The team walked into the nearby complex and saw barricades with mercs on them trying to get line of sight on Archangel.

"These guys are gonna be pissed when we turn on them." Jacob remarked.

"They can go fuck themselves for all I care. Our mission is to get Archangel, and no merc is getting in our way." Six replied.

As she said this, a round bounced off of her shields, taking them down to 38% capacity.

All three slid behind a crate.

"Why didn't he just kill you? He had a straight shot. Why use concussive rounds?" Jacob asked.

"He's toying with us; trying to psych us out." Six answered.

They slipped into the building, and found a room containing a YMIR mech.

"That's probably what they're going to send after us when their team dies." Tali said.

"Then let's screw it up a little." Six said as she approached the nearby console.

"Try reprogramming its targeting; that way, they won't know it's been sabotaged until they activate it." Tali said.

"Good idea. You should probably do this."

Tali walked over to the terminal and punched in a few commands. The screen lit up and text scrolled across the screen.

_Target parameters changed._

"Good work, Tali. Now let's go find that gunship."

They walked through the complex, with Six taking another round, which again damaged her shields. All she did this time was flip her middle finger in the direction of the shot.

"Do you think he knows what that means?" Jacob asked.

"It's pretty universal."

They found the hangar bay, with a Blue Suns merc working on the gunship while four others sat around waiting for the signal.

"Are you five the infiltration team?"

"Damn right we are." The mechanic said.

"So you fix the gunship _and_ you're going after Archangel?"

"I have a lot of experience with both mechanics and infiltration. So naturally, I'm leading the team."

"What happened to the gunship?"

"Archangel hit the port stabilizer. Nothing serious, but it does hamper the maneuverability. I need to get this thing fixed before~"

A terminal nearby blared an alarm. The merc shot over and looked.

"That's the signal! Go! I'll finish this!" He shouted.

The four mercs left and the mechanic walked over to inspect the stabilizer.

Six noticed that he had left his electric welder on the table near her. She grabbed it and walked over to him.

"You're working too hard."

She jabbed the merc in the back, and he spasmed around a bit before falling over, unconscious. Six dragged the body behind a stack of crates.

"Let's go."

The three left the hangar and jumped the barricades, finding the four mercs already advancing on the building where Archangel was.

"Hit them. No quarter." Six whispered.

The three of them opened fire, Six and Jacob with assault rifles, and Tali with her pistol.

As they fell, one shouted, "Shit! They're with Archangel!" He was gunned down a second later.

"Come on! Haul ass!" Six ordered.

They ran into the building and up to the second level, where they found a helmeted Turian taking pot shots at a group of mercs that had tried to follow Six' squad.

"Archangel?" Six said.

The Turian held up one finger, shot again, and turned. He removed his helmet as he did.

"Tali? What are you doing here? And who are these two?" He said.

"Garrus! It's good to see you again."

"I'm Jacob Taylor."

"Just call me 'Lieutenant.'"

"Alright. Why are you here?"

"We need your help against the Collectors. We're building a team." Six explained.

"Sounds like old times, eh, Tali?"

"Pretty much."

"So, who else do we have? I'm sure that, like usual, I'm the last one you look for."

"Not exactly. And this isn't our operation." Tali said.

"Then whose is it?"

Six had tuned out the conversation and was contacting Shepard.

"Commander, we found Archangel. He's a Turian by the name of Garrus. Tali knows him, so I assume you do, too."

"_Garrus?! Get me a link_."

"On it."

Garrus' omni-tool lit up.

"_Garrus! What are you doing here?_" Shepard said.

"Shepard? I… I heard you were dead." The Turian said in disbelief.

"_Cerberus put me back together after the Collectors attacked the_ Normandy_. Now I'm working with them to stop the Collectors._"

"Cerberus?! You're shitting me, right?"

"_No. The Collectors are being used by the Reapers, just like Saren and the Geth_._ Cerberus is helping me take them down._"

"Perfect. Sounds like the good old days, Shepard. Count me in."

"_Good to hear. Meet you back on the _Normandy."

"I take it Cerberus rebuilt it?"

"_Yeah. It's… different. You'll see when you get there. Shepard out._"

The link was ended, and Garrus grabbed his sniper rifle again.

"Well, then. Let's find a way out of this hellhole. We should wait for them to exhaust their forces, and then get out of here. The bridge provides a great funnel; puts them right in my scopes. But that also means that we'll be vulnerable when we leave, so we need to time this perfectly."

"Shouldn't they've attacked again?" Jacob asked.

"Let me check."

Garrus aimed his Mantis sniper rifle at the other side of the bridge.

"Hm… they're getting ready. They've got shock troops mixed with regular mercs and mechs. Too bad I've got a lot of ammo. Take a look, Lieutenant."

He handed the rifle to Six, who aimed where Garrus had. She checked that it was loaded, and fired. The shot hit a mech straight in the head, and it went up in a shower of sparks, startling the mercs and other mechs.

"One less to worry about." She said as she handed the rifle back.

"So says you."

Garrus reloaded and shot again, hitting a merc in the head. The round flew into the foot of another merc, taking him out of the fight.

"_That's_ how you separate the rookies from the pros."

His omni-tool lit up, and an alarm sounded.

"Damn it! They've breached the lower levels. Lieutenant, I need you to go down there and stop them from getting up here."

"On it. Tali: stay here and help Garrus."

"I can protect myself." The Turian retorted.

"I know. But that rifle won't help you when the mercs come knocking."

"Fine. You're as stubborn as Shepard, you know that? And by the way, I appreciated the gesture you gave me on the way here. Made me feel a little better."

"Don't even go there."

And with that, Six and Jacob left.

"So what's her story? It can't be simple." Garrus asked Tali.

"I don't know. She's been extremely secretive for as long as I've been on the _Normandy_. Shepard told me she nearly killed a Cerberus operative, Miranda Lawson, who tried to hack her omni-tool."

Garrus was silent, his C-Sec training kicking in. He was intent on finding what the woman was hiding.

Six and Jacob entered the sublevel of the building, and immediately found one doorway that needed sealed.

"Garrus, we're in the sub-level. How do we shut the accessways?"

"_There's a shutter control panel for each of the three accessways. It should be right next to the opening._"

"Got it."

Six vaulted the railing and ran to the only visible shutter control. As she did, Blood Pack Vorcha, Krogan and their Varren allies began to appear on the other side of the accessway, running and gunning to get at Garrus. Six hit the button to close the shutter, and a countdown appeared on the terminal.

_10._

Six primed and threw a grenade into the cramped corridor, the blast killing at least 5 Vorcha and 3 Varren.

_9._

The first Krogan charged at Six. She stood her ground, intending to meet the warrior head-on.

_8._

The Krogan was halfway through the corridor. Six grabbed her AR and fired at the other Blood Pack mercs.

_7._

The Krogan was on top of Six. She dropped her AR and cocked her fist.

_6._

Six punched the Krogan in the face with enough force to make a fully loaded pickup truck flip end-over-end. The impact caved the Krogan's skull in and smashed his brain. The warrior fell over dead.

_5._

The rest of the Blood Pack mercs panicked as Six retrieved her AR, reloaded, and began firing again.

_4._

Another Krogan began to charge, but Six threw another grenade, which staggered it and killed the 3 Vorcha following it.

_3._

A heavy volley of rounds from the Vorcha hit Six's shields, bringing them down to 25% capacity.

_2._

The other mercs now opened fire, breaking the LT's shields and hitting her a few times.

_1._

Six dove behind the wall as her vitals began to drop from the shots.

_0._

The shutter closed abruptly. Six was bleeding from a single round that had gotten through her armor on the upper portion of her right arm. She applied some medi-gel to it, and it sealed up.

The duo went for the left doorway, which led to a small corridor with short barricades to provide cover for the entrenched mercs. They popped up and opened fire on the Spartan and her partner, who slid behind one of the barricades.

"_Six, one of them is right on the other side. You can pull him over and kill him easily._" Cortana told her.

Six did. As her Spartan Time kicked in, she stood up over the cover and grabbed the unfortunate merc by his helmet. She slammed him to the ground and buried her knife in his throat.

"Shit!" Another shouted.

Six remembered that she had a cloak function, and activated it.

"Cortana, give me a visual representation of how long I can stay cloaked."

"_On it, Lieutenant._"

A black circle appeared next to the white one, indicating how much time she had before she became visible again, roughly 10 seconds.

(In Spartan Time)

She vaulted the barricade and stabbed another merc in mid-air. She landed and slammed a Blue Suns Centurion's face into the barricade as the others turned to attack the spot where the dead Centurion now lay. Six was already over the final barricade and now opened up with her AR at point blank range, massacring the unfortunate mercs. Her cloak started to fade, but the mercs were all dead before she became visible.

Time began to return to normal for the Spartan as her body began to process the adrenaline rush. She ran towards the console and punched in the command. There was about five seconds of peace before the Blue Suns began to pour in towards the accessway. The door shut as the mercs reached the door.

The last accessway was in a wide open vehicle bay. The Blood Pack mercs inside were entrenched.

_This is going to be one big clusterf-_

"Lieutenant! Shoot the barrels! They'll explode!" Jacob shouted.

She pulled up her pistol and shot 3 times at an explosive crate that four unfortunate Vorcha were hiding behind. The crate blew up, and the Vorcha became chunks on the ground.

Six was blindsided by a Krogan and thrown to the ground. Six grabbed her knife and stabbed into the Krogan's throat, but the warriors tough armor prevented the blade from going very deep.

"Heh heh. I'm gonna enjoy this." The Krogan said menacingly.

A shotgun blast rang through the air, and the Krogan's eyes went wide. It fell over with a hole in its side.

"Nobody fucks with my friends." Jacob said as he shot the Krogan in the head.

He helped Six up, and the pair racked their shotguns in perfect sync and mowed down three Vorcha that were unfortunate enough to stick their heads up. Six ran over and closed the shutter.

"Garrus, we've closed all the shutters."

"_Good job. Get back up here. The mercs are preparing to launch another assault._"

"On our way."

The two made their way back up to Garrus, quietly taking down a pair of mercs at the bottom of the stairs.

Upstairs they found a Krogan flanked by two Vorcha trying to attack Garrus from behind. Six drew her shotgun and blasted the two Vorcha into smithereens. The Krogan whipped around, and was met by a double blast of shotguns that took his shields down to just 8%. Six popped the pin on her last frag and threw it, rolling into cover as she did. The grenade blew up, tearing through the Krogan's shields and some of his armor.

The Krogan racked his shotgun and unleashed hell upon the Spartan and her ally. Six shouldered her SMG and retaliated, breaking through the warrior's armor after burning through two clips. She activated her incinerate ability and launched it at the Krogan.

"Hah! That tickles a bit!"

She cloaked and walked around the Krogan.

"COME OUT AND FACE ME!"

"See if this tickles."

Six sank her combat knife into the back of the Krogan's neck as she disabled her cloak. He fell over, bleeding from the open wound. Six grabbed her M6G Magnum and put three rounds in the Krogan's head.

She and Jacob walked over to Garrus' sniper perch, finding him and Tali watching the bridge intently.

"Nice job with Garm, the Krogan. He leads the Blood Pack. Been trying to get him for a while now. Had a chance a few months ago. Caught him alone, and nearly got him, but reinforcements came and I had to break off. I've never seen a Krogan regenerate that fast before. Not even Urdnot Wrex."

"Okay, now that the Blood Pack leadership is disrupted, what should we do?"

"While you were closing those shutters, the Eclipse mercs attacked. Tali put their leadership in chaos with a very well timed shot and killed Jaroth, their leader. All that's left is the Blue Suns."

As he said this, the gunship that Six sabotaged flew up on their left side.

"Gunship! Get to cover!" Garrus shouted.

"We sabotaged it. The port stabilizer is the weak point. Aim for that." Tali yelled.

"Nice thinking."

"We've got hostiles on the floor below us!" Jacob announced.

"I'll handle them. You three take the gunship." Six said.

"Good luck." Jacob called after her.

"I have ammo and my armor has power. I don't need luck."

She ran down the stairs, opening up with her MA37 Assault Rifle as she went. She dropped three troopers before she got down the steps, and suddenly remembered that she had stashed a pair of plasma grenades in her armor. She went for the pouch, and it was empty.

"Fucking Cerberus bastards!"

She pulled out her M7 SMG and dual-wielded her AR in one hand and her SMG in the other. She dropped her AR magazine and began firing with her SMG while she reloaded her rifle. She killed a Centurion and a Trooper before having to reload twice. Combined fire from both her MA37 and her M7 felled the last Centurion.

"_Lieutenant! Garrus has been hit! It's bad! Get up here!_" Tali yelled into the comm.

"On my way!"

She raced back up the stairs and found the Turian lying in a pool of his own blood, and the gunship peppering the area with bullets.

Suddenly, the gunship lurched as it was hit by a super-high-velocity round, which destroyed the port stabilizer and caused it to crash and explode.

"_You told me to use it sparingly, Lieutenant._" Shepard said over the comms.

"Shepard! Get up here, now! Garrus has been hit, hard by the looks of it."

"_On it. Joker, Get the shuttle_ _down here, ASAP!_"

"_On its way, Commander._"

Shepard, Miranda, and a Salarian, presumably Mordin Solus, ran into the room, and Shepard bolted over to Garrus' unconscious form.

"Garrus! Garrus!"

The Turian lay still for a moment before his eyes shot open and he took a sudden breath.

"Garrus! Hang on. Help's coming."

The Normandy's shuttle swung in alongside the apartment building, and Shepard and Six carried Garrus into the shuttle.

_Normandy SR-2 Briefing Room._

The five members of the Omega team waited earnestly for news about Garrus from Dr. Solus. Solus had been able to stabilize the Turian, and had put in cybernetics to hold his face together, as he had been hit by a rocket from the gunship.

"If anyone can come back from something like that, it's Garrus." Shepard commented.

"How do you know Garrus?" Six asked.

"He helped me defeat Sovereign and Saren."

"Hm…"

Six had read about those two in her studies. They were both interesting. Saren reminded her of a Spartan-II: willing to do anything to get the job done, and seemingly immune to the law. She respected that first part, even if she despised his methods: killing innocent civilians was unacceptable. Sovereign, on the other hand, was a complete unknown to her. It seemed to her like Sovereign and the Office of Naval Intelligence were alike: both used others to accomplish their goals. ONI just had humanity's best interests at heart. What scared the Lieutenant was the fact that Sovereign could control someone when the Reaper itself was in dark space.

_That could happen to me!_ She thought.

Mordin Solus walked in, with a little bit of blood still on his hands.

"Cybernetic implant successful. Turian liable to make full recovery. Scars will remain, though. May prove to be… problematic. Could fix with right equipment."

"That's okay. I like them the way they are."

Garrus walked in behind the Salarian, now sporting a nasty scar on the right side of his face.

"Garrus, you okay?" Shepard asked.

"I've been better, Shepard. I'm even better now that I know that the rumors of your return are true." He and Shepard shook hands for the first time in two years.

"It's good to see you again." Shepard said.

"You too."

After a few minutes of talking, the crew went their separate ways, with Garrus setting up shop in the main battery.

In the armory, Six constructed a message.

_Briefing Room. 5 minutes._

She sent the message to Jacob, Garrus, Tali, and Shepard, and then walked over to the briefing room.

**Woohoo! Done with another chapter! Next up, Six's past! That will take a whole shitload of a chapter, and then our heroes are off to find the other recruits for their team. I have a tie-in story planned and in production that will introduce an OC team that will make an appearance in the later chapters. It's up on my Bio and called 'Raven Team'. I'll post that whenever I get around to it. **


	8. Chapter 7

Chapter 7: Skeletons

**AN's: This chapter is by far the biggest thing I have ever written. It's over 10,000 (Words, that is)! Sorry, but I need to get my version of Six's past out in one chapter. There are a few parts of the Reach Campaign that I'm really going to focus on, those being Winter Contingency, Tip of the Spear, Long Night of Solace, part of Exodus (Where I have a little plot-twist thought up), and the end of The Package. I will also be going into some detail about the rest of the UNSC's history.**

Six stood at the front of the Briefing Room, awaiting the arrival of Shepard, Jacob, Tali, and Garrus. As she did, she triple-checked the room for any surveillance devices. Finding a few, she had Cortana disable them, and check the console for bugs. Finding none, she uploaded Cortana into the console. Then the Lieutenant drifted off into deep thought about what to tell her new friends.

_May as well tell them everything. If I found my way here, then the Covenant can too._

The doors behind her opened, and the four walked and situated themselves around the briefing table.

"You made sure that there is no way for anyone outside of this room to hear anything I say?" she asked Cortana.

"_Yes, Lieutenant. Checking again… Done._"

"Good work. Lock the door."

The door shut and the panel in the center turned red, denying access from the outside.

"You've got tighter security than C-Sec ever did." Garrus commented.

"That's because I don't want Cerberus to find out anything about me. And before you ask, I trust Jacob to keep his mouth shut."

"I take it you're going to explain your past to us?" Shepard asked.

"Yeah. It's a long one though, so get comfortable."

Six took a deep breath, removed her helmet for the first time since arriving in this universe, and gathered her thoughts.

"Where I'm from, there is no Citadel; No Mass Relays, no Reapers, nothing that is familiar to you. Except for humanity. There's the UNSC, which represents humanity, and the Covenant, an alliance of alien races that has been at war with us for the last 30 years."

"First contact was in 2525, when one of our Outer Colonies, Harvest, suddenly went dark. No communications left the planet. A recon group sent to investigate was nearly obliterated. One ship made it back to the UNSC, telling of a vastly superior ship that had decimated the group of 2 destroyers and three corvettes. UNSC FLEETCOM organized the largest battlegroup in history to take the colony back, because as they left, the ship reported that more alien ships had begun to enter the system. There were over 200,000 civilians on Harvest, all assumed dead after what the battlegroup found."

Cortana pulled up an image of Harvest, with Covenant ships surrounding the planet and laying waste to the surface.

"What are they doing to the planet?" Tali asked.

"They're glassing it. Using high-energy plasma, they bombarded the surface, burning anything down there. Less than half of the civilians actually made it off of the surface, and most of those were killed in orbit by the Covenant's anti-ship weapons."

"The battlegroup destroyed the Covenant fleet, but they also had three ships for every ship the Covenant had."

"The Covenant swept through the Outer Colonies, destroying anything in their path. The next major battle was at Arcadia in 2531, my homeworld. I was only five when my parents were killed in the attack. I was put in an orphanage on the colony, as the Covenant had not glassed the whole planet."

"Years earlier, before even Harvest, the UNSC Office of Naval Intelligence had undertaken the SPARTAN-II project, an effort to make augmented super-soldiers. The candidates were taken at the age of six and conscripted into the Navy. They were a huge success when they were deployed against the Covenant years later. The project went public, boosting the sagging morale of the soldiers. Tales of lone II's holding off thousands of Covenant troops became the stuff of legends."

"But it wasn't enough. There were too few of them to turn the tide of the war, as over half died in the augmentation process, and the next group was delayed because of a lack of specific genetic markers that the program required. So ONI approved the SPARTAN-III project, which took kids between the ages of six and twelve into training and disregarded the genetic markers that made the II's successful. There were more us, we were easier to train and equip, and we were cheaper to make."

"I was taken in 2537, at the age of eleven."

"And they just took you?" Jacob asked.

"Yeah. I don't remember much of it, though."

"That's harsh."

"When the human race is at risk of extinction, humans do anything to preserve it, even if that means conscripting kids."

"The III's were a success, with every member of all three companies of around 300 surviving the augmentations. But ONI squandered us on suicide missions. Only those that were pulled out for other tasks survived. Like me."

"I was assigned to the ONI Beta-5 Asymmetrical Action Group, making hit-and-run attacks against Covenant forces. Though there were other missions as well."

"This is where it always goes from shit to hell." Garrus commented.

"Pretty much. My CO assigned me and a few other Spartans to take out human targets. He said that they were threats to the safety of our species, and we went along. After about three years, I left and became a pilot for the Sabre program, which made the YSS-1000 Sabre space superiority fighter. After three years there, I was transferred to a Spartan fireteam, NOBLE, just before the battle for one of the closest colonies to Earth: Reach."

"Cortana, open all video files classified at level 7 and above."

"_Yes, Lieutenant._"

"Is that an AI?" Tali asked.

"Yeah. She's a 'smart' AI, she can store nearly infinite amounts of data, but her cognitive processes will begin to deteriorate after 7 years of operation."

Tali glared behind her helmet.

"_Don't worry, Tali. I've still got 3 years to go before that happens. And I'm not like the Geth: I can't interface with the Lieutenant's suit or any other constructs directly, I am essentially an advanced VI._"

"That's good to know." Tali responded, still cautious.

"But as I was saying, Reach was a nightmare. The whole planet had been laid to waste when I was shot here two years ago." Six continued.

The screen on the table started to play a series of recordings from Six's helmet-cam.

The first was of her first meeting with NOBLE.

The leader, Carter, was a stern, no-bullshit type of Commander, and Shepard respected that and also secretly wished that he could have met the man.

NOBLE 2, Kat, was apparently a technical genius, and that garnered Tali's attention.

Jun, NOBLE 3, was an excellent sniper and recon man, and Garrus instantly assumed that he could best him. (**He can't! No one can!**)

NOBLE 4, Emile, made Tali and Garrus shift nervously in their seats, as he had an especially inbred hatred for any and all things alien or Insurrectionist.

Jorge, NOBLE 5, was the heavy weapons expert, and his signature weapon confirmed that: an M249 HMG, normally mounted on a tripod, and Jorge carried one, minus the tripod, with him.

The team's newest mission was to investigate a disabled communications relay outpost at Visegrad. The relay transmitted was responsible for all extra-planetary communications in that region of the planet, and thus it going down cut Reach off from the rest of the UNSC. Carter's comment caught the team's attention.

"I'm not going to lie to you, Lieutenant; you're stepping into some shoes the rest of the squad would rather leave unfilled. Me, I'm just happy to have NOBLE back up to full strength. Just one thing:"

Jacob's eyebrows dropped a bit in confusion.

"I've seen your file, even the parts the ONI censors didn't want me to. I'm glad to have your skill set. But we're a team. That lone wolf stuff stays behind. Clear?" NOBLE 1 continued.

"Got it, sir." Six responded.

"Welcome to Reach." Jun said as the Falcon aircraft lifted off for Visegrad.

The screen went to black, and a few seconds later, the interior of the Falcon appeared on the screen. According to the pilot, NOBLE was about a minute from Visegrad.

"Listen up, NOBLE Team: We're looking at a downed relay outpost 50 clicks from Visegrad. We're gonna introduce ourselves to whoever took it out, and then Kat's gonna get it back online." Carter said.

"_Just get me under the hood, Commander._"

"_Sir, why would rebels want to cut off Reach from the rest of the colonies?_" Jorge asked.

"You get a chance; maybe you can ask them, Jorge."

30 seconds out.

"_Commander, we just lost our signal with HQ._" Kat reported.

"Backup channels?"

"_Searching… Nada. Can't say what's jamming us._"

"You heard her: dead zone confirmed. Command will not be keeping us company on this trip."

"_I'm lonely already_." Emile commented.

As they approached Visegrad, the one distinguishing feature was a giant radar dish, which according to Six's HUD, was Visegrad relay. A blue diamond close by indicated a distress beacon nearby.

"Could be the missing troopers, let's check it out." Carter said.

The investigation turned up nearly empty: it was a military beacon, but there was no ID.

After talking to a few local farmers and finding that something was there, and also finding two of the missing Army troopers dead and apparently interrogated, they ran into the _Normandy_ crew's first look at the Covenant: Skirmishers, small and agile, they made great marksmen.

"Goddamnit!" Emile yelled.

"Covenant! Jorge shouted.

"Contact! Contact! Spartans, assist!" Carter ordered.

Minutes later, the Spartans ran into a squad of Elite Ultras. They were so similar in personality to Turians, it unnerved Garrus.

While Emile and Kat went to the relay, Jorge, Carter, and Six went to recon the East Valley and find the missing troopers of 3-Charlie. They found and evaced them and then were airlifted to the relay, where Kat had almost gotten the door open. Then the Covenant dropships started to arrive, dropping off Jackals, the Skirmisher's cousin, less agile, but they had wrist gauntlets that projected shields, Elites of varying ranks, and Grunts. (**'Nuff said.**)

Once inside, they found the relay controls burned out by plasma damage, and a body nearby. Six searched it, and found a data disk that Kat swiftly snatched from the LT's outstretched hand. Just minutes later, the five Spartans were ambushed by three high-ranking Elites, all Zealot-class, with one Field Marshall. Jorge had been caught off-guard, and had to duck to avoid having his head shorn off by the Field Marshall's Energy Sword. Emile and Six instantly opened fire with their AR's, and the Field Marshall barreled past Six as he escaped, throwing the III to the ground. Emile put a clip into the nearest Zealot, which felled the Elite's shields, but it still stood over Six and readied an energy dagger.

As it plunged the weapon down, Jacob gasped.

Six caught the weapon in her left hand and punched her assailant in the face with her right. It roared and was promptly kicked off the Lieutenant by Carter, and executed by Emile's shotgun.

The last Zealot had escaped with the Field Marshall, so NOBLE went back to repairing the relay.

"Commander, the relay's innards have been burned to hell. I can splice into the main overland bundle and get you a direct connection to Colonel Holland, but I need someone to reset the main junction." Kat reported.

"Emile, Six, that's you, reset the junction and get back here, ASAP."

"We're on it, Commander." Six said as she an Emile left for the junction.

A few minutes later, the two Spartans returned after resetting the junction.

"Signal! It's patchy but it's there." Kat said.

"I'll take it." Carter said, taking off his helmet.

"Best not touch anything. You wouldn't want to ground this place." Kat said as the screen went to black.

The next log was of NOBLE's mission to repel Covenant forces from ONI's Sword Base. It was fairly straightforward, until the team was called down to the science wing by Dr. Halsey.

"Come again? Sounded like you said 'Halsey'." Jorge said.

The two were standing on the top floor of Sword Base, after helping Emile shoot down Banshee aircraft that were preventing the destruction of the Corvette that was attacking the base.

"_I did._" Carter said over the comms.

"Copy that, on our way."

"Don't need Command to tell me. Been all hers half my life." Jorge said as they walked down.

As the pair walked into the science wing, they found Halsey and Carter in a somewhat-heated discussion.

"I requested your assistance, Commander, and do not need a report of what occurred on my doorstep; what I _do_ need is a detailed report of your previous engagement- Jorge, it's been too long." She said as she noticed the II.

"Ma'am."

"What have you done with my armor?" She asked with a hint of confusion.

"Just some… additions I've made."

"Indeed."

She once again addressed the Commander.

"Visegrad Relay: its data center was home to one of my xenoarchaeologists, Professor Lazlo Sorvad. Perhaps you could shed some light on his death."

"If he was a civilian male in his mid- 60's, then he died with a Covenant Energy Sword through his abdomen." Carter responded.

"Elites, then."

"They engaged us as well. It was…just after we found your scientist's daughter, ma'am. She was hiding in the~" Jorge started.

"Irrelevant. The Elites, tell me more about them."

"There were three, Zealot-class, two got by us, the leader and his LT, by the looks of them."

"Zealots? You're sure?" Halsey asked with fear creeping into her voice.

"Their armor configuration matched."

"Shield strength, too." Six added.

"_I_ gave the order not to pursue. Our primary objective was to get the station's relay back online." Carter said.

"Your primary objective? Commander, are you a puppet, or a Spartan?" She asked in disgust.

"Ma'am?" The Commander responded in confusion.

"There are those at ONI, myself included, who believe the Covenant dispatch Elite advance teams to hunt down artifacts of value to their religion. No doubt they came to the station for the abundance of ONI excavation data stored there. Survivor accounts suggest such teams are small, nimble and almost _always_ Zealot-class. And you let them get away."

"Data retrieval was not a command directive. Even had we known, we had other, more pressing matters to attend to."

"Like warning the planet." Kat added.

"Professor Sorvad's final entry in his field notes made reference to a 'latchkey discovery'. 'Latchkey', not a word he would use lightly. So let's hope that the data module that your Lieutenant-Commander _stole_… contains it."

"Kat?" Carter asked.

NOBLE 2 procured the data module from one of her armor's pouches, and put it in a glass container that she slid to Halsey, who was separated from NOBLE by bulletproof glass.

"Before you inquire, I was alerted the moment you tried to access its contents, as I am with _any_ unauthorized tap. That data is classified Tier-1. I could send you to the brig for interfering with my work."

Carter took a half-step forward.

"Maybe you'd like to join her."

"I'm sorry?"

"We're currently under Emergency Planetary Directive, WINTER CONTINGENCY. I'm sure you're familiar with the punishment for civilian interference with a Spartan deployment."

"Are you _threatening_ me, Commander?"

"Just making a reading suggestion, ma'am. Let's move, NOBLE Team."

The Spartans began to file out of the room.

"Ma'am?" Jorge asked.

"That… will be all, Jorge." She sounded defeated as she said this.

The screen faded to black.

"Okay, I have to ask: why is that woman so special? She seems arrogant to me." Garrus asked.

"That is Dr. Catherine Halsey, the mastermind behind the SPARTAN-II's. Her research led to the development of the III's." Six explained.

"Alright, then."

The next video was of Six and Jun's mission to scout a Covenant 'dark zone' where surveillance equipment could see nothing. It was relatively uneventful, a few firefights, no big deal. Then, the pair found the reason for the jamming.

Six and Jun crawled up to the edge of the cliff they were on. They saw a gigantic landing zone, had to have been 20 miles in diameter.

"Jackpot." Jun commented.

"Transmitting visual." Six said.

"You seeing this, Kat?"

"_Confirmed. Receiving NOBLE 3 and NOBLE 6 live visual of a Covenant strike force._"

"That's no strike force, it's an invading army. If we're gonna smother this thing, we need to go in hard and fast." Jun advised.

"_Agreed. All recon teams disengage and fall back. Sun will be up in a few hours, and it's going to be a very busy day._"

The screen faded to black and changed to a view of Six in a Warthog driven by Kat. The pair was leading a convoy of Scorpion tanks, Warthogs, Mongoose ATV's, Falcons, and Pelican dropships against the Covenant force.

"So this was that 'busy day' she mentioned." Jacob commented.

"_It appears that NOBLE Team's discovery last night was not an anomaly: large Covenant deployments have occurred undetected, and we are now under attack across the Viery territory, including orbital defenses. As per the WINTER CONTINGENCY, we are countering on every front. NOBLE's reconnaissance has also revealed sophisticated Covenant army hiding canopies, and has pinpointed what is believed to be a landing zone for additional Covenant forces, the origin of which is yet to be determined."_ The AI called Dot explained.

The convoy raced along towards the Covenant LZ.

"_That landing zone has been tagged by UNSC Command as a priority one target._" Carter informed the team.

"_Det-charge link is loud and clear_!" Jun said.

"Copy that, acquiring signal-lock on the pylon." Kat said.

She pulled out a detonator and flipped off the cover.

"Detonating in 3…2."

She hit the button, and on Six's right, a small tower blew up.

A shitload of Banshees swooped in from in front of them, while Wraith mortar tanks launched plasma mortars from afar.

"Shit! Swooping is bad! Very bad!" The Army trooper on the turret shouted as he pelted the alien aircraft with HMG rounds.

The other Warthog gunners joined him, bringing down a few of them before they got in range.

The Banshees began firing, radioactive fuel rods hurtling towards the convoy. The blasts destroyed at least five of the Warthogs and one of the Falcons.

A Wraith mortar round streaked towards the bridge they had to cross.

"Incoming!" Six shouted.

The mortar destroyed the bridge.

"Might want to hold on to something!" Kat said as she slammed her foot down on the gas pedal.

The Warthog jumped the gap, and rolled on impact, throwing Six and Kat out as it did.

Six and Kat slowly pushed towards a pair of Covenant AA guns, and neutralized them.

"_Good work, Noble Six. UNSC Air Support, skies are clear._" Carter said.

"_Copy. 2-Lima-4, bombing run heading 224.6 permission granted. Out._"

Two frigates flew in overhead and began to bombard the canyon below the Spartans with chainguns.

The pair advanced deeper into Covenant territory, coming across a mining facility that was filled with Covenant.

"_New intelligence: early forces near the Covenant outpost have sighted a high-value target: an Elite Zealot, in fact._" Dot reported.

"A Zealot?! We're onto something big here, Commander." Kat told him.

"_Eyes on the prize, Noble. Take out that Zealot if you get the chance, but keep moving towards the spire._"

The pair cleared the mining facility, but the Zealot escaped them.

"He's going for the Revenant!" Kat shouted as they ran after the Elite.

Six threw a plasma grenade, which stuck to the driver's side of the mini-mortar tank. The explosion killed the Zealot and destroyed the Revenant.

"High-value target has been neutralized. Impressive, Six."

"_Six, scans show _another_ AA gun near your location. I want you to neutralize that gun, by any means necessary_." Carter informed her.

The gun was guarded by a pair of Hunters, a trio of Skirmishers, and a patrol of Grunts led by an Elite. The patrol was run over by a pair of Ghosts, as were the Skirmishers.

Six sped past the Hunters, hoping to lure them into the AA gun's inner workings. It worked.

"This is gonna hurt." She commented as she threw a plasma grenade into the power core.

The grenade's explosion sent the gun into a wild-cat destabilization, which was now set to go explosive. Six locked her armor as the Hunters entered the structure, and the gun blew up. Six was thrown clear of the gun and landed near the wreckage of a Falcon.

"Never doing that again." Six commented.

"_Well done, Six. ONI needs up-close recon on those spires, so we're gonna fly you the rest of the way." _Carter said.

"Jorge has a Falcon enroute to our position, Lieutenant; highlighting the LZ now." Kat told her.

"Commander, I'm going to set up a forward observation post here." NOBLE 2 told Carter.

"_I'm waiting on new intel, see what you can see, Carter out._"

Six walked to the LZ and got on the right side turret, outfitted with a grenade launcher.

"Need a lift, Spartan?" Jorge asked as she entered.

"Spotted some nasty business in the canyon on the way down." He continued.

"_I'll call out targets as we go!_" The pilot said.

The Covenant forces in the canyon were surprisingly thin, only a few AA Shade turrets and Wraiths, and some ground forces.

"_There's the spire!_" The pilot said as they approached a blue dome surrounding a good sized area around the spire.

"_Latest intel suggests these spires may project electromagnetic cloaking fields._" Dot told them.

The pilot hesitated for a few seconds.

"Priority One, pilot; gotta know what's in there." Jorge told him.

"_Affirmative, sir. Here we go._"

The Falcon started towards the field, and passed through. The whine of the engines suddenly started to die down.

"_We just lost all power! We're going down!_" The pilot shouted

The Falcon spun out of control.

"Lock your armor, Spartan!" Jorge shouted at Six.

"_Brace for a hard landing!_"

The Falcon slammed into the ground, throwing the III from the wreck, and probably saving her from being crushed by the wreckage. The rest of the crew, minus Jorge, wasn't so lucky: crushed under debris, or thrown out during the spin and slapped onto the ground. The pilot, though, had been impaled with a piece of one of the propellers, telling of the forces imparted in the crash.

"Ouch. I hope it was quick." Jacob commented.

Six stayed silent, knowing what came next.

She infiltrated the spire and disable the shields, then took off at a dead sprint for the edge of the spire. If she missed the Falcon that was hovering about 10 meters off, she would fall about 100 meters to her death. She jumped, and everyone in the briefing room held their breath.

She missed the foot rail, but Jorge caught her outstretched hand and hauled her into the Falcon.

"Get us out of here!" Carter told the pilot.

"Control, this is Noble 1, Spire One is green, and you're free to engage. Have a nice day."

"_Copy. All ground units: Frigate Three-One-Eight Heavy is inbound, and MAC rounds have been authorized._"

"MAC Rounds?! In atmosphere?!" Jorge asked, astounded by the decision.

"One way to get their attention. Hang on to your teeth, people." Carter responded

The frigate _Grafton_ flew over the Falcon, heading towards the spire. A gigantic flash and bang resounded, and to spire blew up.

"What was that?!" Garrus asked.

"A MAC. Uses superconducting coils to hyperaccelerate a 600-ton depleted uranium slug to about 20% of lightspeed."

As she finished, a beam split the _Grafton_'s midsection.

_"New contact. High-tonnage._" Dot reported.

"No… NO! SOMEBODY TELL ME THIS AIN'T HAPPENING!" Jorge yelled in anger.

"_UNSC frigate Grafton, do you copy?!" _Control asked.

"The _Grafton _is dust! We need to get out of here, NOW!" Carter yelled into the comms.

Six looked back at the source, a Covenant Supercarrier, sitting in low orbit.

"Oh… Keelah. That thing is HUGE!" Tali said in complete and total terror.

"Good thing it's not here." Garrus commented.

"Hey, if I came here, then so can _they_. That's why I'm sharing so much with you."

"Right…"

"Well, I'd say that the Citadel races are fucked if they do find a way here." Shepard added.

"_That would be an understatement, Commander._" Cortana commented.

"Is she usually such a smart-ass?"

"I think so." Six said.

Six continued the recordings, the next one detailing Noble Team's counterattack against the Supercarrier, Operation UPPERCUT.

"That thing is crushing us and we're waiting for _backup_?! They'll be backing up a graveyard!" Kat practically yelled at Carter.

"All our nukes are either out-system or went down with the ships that carried them. You're preaching to the converted." Carter said, sounding defeated.

"How converted?"

"I know that look, Kat."

"You can say no."

"No."

"You don't even want to hear it?"

"Fine, I'll hear it."

"Remember that accident a few years back? Colony ship enroute to Cygnus? Seven-hundred dead?"

"Vaguely, a Slipspace drive malfunction, right?"

"Actually, it worked fine. The drive was mounted improperly after a service haulout. When it activated, it teleported half the ship to oblivion."

"And this is relevant… _how_?"

"A certain Covenant Supercarrier could, with some assistance, suffer the same, unfortunate accident."

"Even for you, Kat, that's…"

"Inspired?"

"Not the word I would use."

The rest of the team walked up.

"What's going on?" Jorge asked.

"Go ahead, tell them."

Kat reached for Emile's kukri. He immediately grabbed her wrist the second her fingers wrapped around the handle.

"May I?" She asked.

"Don't cut yourself." He said, releasing his grip.

She removed the knife and kneeled down.

"Objective: destroy Covenant Carrier in geosynchronous orbit above us."

"This sanctioned, sir?" Jorge asked Carter.

"What do you think?" He responded.

"Oh."

"Method: a Slipspace drive in lieu of the nukes we don't have. Delivery system: Us. Solvable? Getting us up there. That and getting our hands on a Slipspace drive."

She stood back up, threw the knife a few inches into the air, caught the blade, and returned it to Emile.

"Thank you for sharing."

Emile silently took his kukri back and replaced it in its sheath.

"So… all we need is orbit capable transport and the single most expensive piece of equipment made by man?" Carter asked.

"As a soldier in the field, I couldn't possibly have access to those kinds of resources. That said… a good place to look might be… oh, I don't know; the nearest non-existent launch site in the non-existent Sabre Program dismissed by three administrations as preposterous rumor. And in which our newest member,"

The Spartans all turned to face Six.

"Was certainly never a pilot." Kat concluded.

"You're scary, you know that?" Emile commented.

"All we need is a green light from Holland."

"Good luck with that." Carter commented.

"You're the one asking him." Kat said as she handed him a comm pad.

He reluctantly took it, and walked to the back of the cave they were hiding in.

"Well, there's no way in hell he's gonna go for this." Carter said as he established a link.

"Colonel, this is Noble One."

"_I read you, Commander._"

"Kat devised a plan to take down that Supercarrier."

"_I assume this is going to be a longshot?_"

"Remember the Cygnus colony ship incident?"

"_Don't tell me that you're going to try to recreate that._"

"It's our best shot, sir."

Colonel Holland was silent for a few moments.

"Think he'll say 'yes'?" Jorge asked Six.

"I hope so. If not, we're all dead."

"_I'm giving you the green light, Commander. I'll start mustering up what we can for you, and see about getting ahold of a Slipspace drive. For now, though, head to Farkas Lake on Eposz. There's a launch site there with orbit capable transport._"

"Sabres, Colonel?" Kat asked.

"_That program was top-secret, Noble 2. I hope the Lieutenant didn't say anything_."

"She was tight-lipped, Colonel. I found out on my own."

"_Alright. And yes, there are Sabres there. I'll get in touch and have them prep one for you. Only two can go up, so choose wisely. Good luck, Noble. Holland out._"

The link was cut.

"So who's going?" Jun asked.

"Kat, Jorge, Six: we'll go to the launch facility. Jorge and Six, you're going to orbit." Carter answered.

"Affirmative." Jorge said.

"Yes, sir."

"Jun, Emile, prep a Falcon to pick us up when Jorge and Six go up. We'll need a ride out."

"We're on it, Commander."

"Let's get to it, Noble Team."

The next log was of the launch team's fight up to the facility.

"Spartans coming in, watch your fire!" A female Army soldier yelled at her teammates.

"Still can't believe Holland said 'yes' to this." Jorge commented as the four Spartans ran to the launch pad.

"Then let's get that Sabre airborne before he changes his mind." Carter shot back.

They found the launch pad, and Six and Jorge entered the Falcon, with Six piloting, naturally, and Jorge as the radar and comms operator.

The Sabre launched shortly thereafter, and the pair linked up with the space station Anchor 9, and helped defend it against a Covenant attack force, in which Six proudly showed off her skills in the fighter.

"I think Joker would be put to shame right now." Shepard commented.

"He's also flying a _frigate_ that about 50 time the size of that fighter. So I'll argue with you on that one." Six argued.

"Fair enough."

The log showed Six's Sabre team, as Jorge had left to operate the Pelican that was to deliver the UNSC Charon-class heavy frigate _Savannah_'s Slipspace drive to a Corvette that was to go on a refueling run with the Supercarrier, leaving to intercept said Corvette.

"_UNSC Savannah. Our wings may be clipped, but we've got your back._"

"_I've stuck my neck out for Noble on this one, Lieutenant._" Holland said over the comms.

"We'll get it done, Colonel. Six out."

They found the Corvette and boarded it, neutralizing the communications crew and hostiles in the hangar before opening the hangar bay door for Jorge's Pelican to land.

"Powder keg is aboard, Colonel." Jorge informed him.

"_Six, get your fireteam to the bridge. The refueling run with the Supercarrier will have to be initiated manually._"

"Yes, sir."

"_Five, stay with the bomb, and discourage the curious._"

"On it, Colonel. Hear that, Lieutenant? I'll be all by my lonesome back here. Make it quick, would you?"

Six led a small squad of marines to the bridge and made somewhat short work of the crew there. On the way, the _Savannah_ was destroyed.

"_Break off, break off! Hull breach! Reactor's flaring! DAMNIT, I'M LOSING HER!_"

Six put the Corvette on the refueling track, and returned to the hangar.

After holding off waves of Covenant forces, there was finally some silence.

"The _Savannah_ did a number on the door, there's no way back up to the Sabres. Noble Six, form up on me."

The rest of Six's fireteam had perished, either on the bridge or in the hangar.

Jorge pressed a few buttons on the bomb.

"_At current velocity, 76 seconds to endpoint._" Dot informed them.

"Damnit. So, it's gonna be like that."

He hit the bomb for good measure.

"Well, I've got good news and bad news. This bird took some fire and her thruster gimbal is toast, so the only way off this slag heap is gravity."

"And the good news?"

"_That was the good news_." Jorge said grimly.

"_53 seconds to endpoint._"

"Yeah, yeah." Jorge said as he removed his helmet and dropped it on the deck.

"Bad news is: timer's fried. I'm gonna have to fire it manually."

"That's… a one-way trip." Six told him.

"We all make it sooner or later. Better get going, Six, they're going to need you down there."

His next words came out as if he had read the Lieutenant's mind. He ripped his dog tags off of his neck.

"Listen, Reach has been good to me, time's come to return the favor." He held out his hand in a comrade's handshake.

"Don't deny me this."

Six understood. He was going to do this, and he was going to throw her out of the hangar. It all depended on if she put up a fight or not. She voiced this understanding to her friends on the _Normandy_.

On the Corvette, she didn't argue. She grabbed Jorge's hand, and he hefted her up and walked over to the hangar bay forcefield.

"Tell 'em to make it count." He said as he threw her out of the hangar.

Six was now in a freefall from high orbit. As she stared intently at the Corvette, she noticed, out of the corner of her eye, a Spartan, flying erratically with a punctured EVA pack. The Spartan was too far away for Six to be able to do anything, so she just silently sent her prayers to the soldier and hoped that she, too, would survive the next few minutes.

As she fell, the Corvette was split in three by the makeshift bomb, and the Supercarrier with it. The threat was over, but it had cost the UNSC so much.

Then came the Slipspace ruptures.

There were so many of them, too many to try to count. More Covenant Ships. And they were itching for a fight.

On the _Normandy_, Six shed a few tears with her back turned to the rest of the crew.

_He died for NOTHING! They all did! Damn those alien fucks! Damn them! If they ever come here, I'll kill each and every one of them myself! They will not touch a single world here, not while I'm breathing. Not while I'm fighting._

"I'm sorry. And after all this, you come here and get our problems dumped in your lap. I'm so sorry." Jacob said.

"It's alright. I need something to stop me from killing everything in sight."

In the logs, Six had landed outside the city of New Alexandria.

"I shit you not, man. That's a Spartan! Fell right from orbit!"

"I find that a little hard to believe, Corporal."

"No, I'm telling you, Sarge, I saw the whole thing! She fell right out of the fucking sky!"

"How do you know it's a she?"

"The armor profile is too small to be a male, sir."

"Alright. Mendoza! See if you can unlock her armor."

An army technician knelt over Six's stiff form. Though he couldn't see it, Six was staring right at him.

"Just… about… got it!"

Six fell limp on the ground for a few seconds before shooting up like a spring-loaded trap.

"WHOA, WHOA, WHOA! Lady, you just took a fall from orbit with nothing more than a shot-up M-Spec Reentry Pack and that armor to protect you. I don't care what you say right now, I'm pulling rank. Sit the fuck down, and let my medic look you over. I don't care if you're the Master Chief's goddamn sister, that's an order." The Sergeant yelled.

Six sat back down and let the medic take a look at her.

"Well, Spartan, nothing too serious: a few sprains and some internal bleeding, nothing your own body can't fix. You're good to go."

"_Now_ you can stand up." The Sergeant told her.

"Holy shit." Jacob commented.

"You know how many people have pulled rank on me?"

"No."

"Two: him, and more recently, Shepard. And that trooper didn't even outrank me."

"That's… not something I saw coming."

The army squad led Six into the city, briefing her as they went.

"After that Supercarrier blew up, a lot more started jumping into the system. A few Corvettes are bombing the city. Civilian evac is ongoing, but they can't leave, since those Corvettes will tear the transports apart the second they do."

"We have a few missile batteries, but we can't get to them. Once we get the last of the civilians onto transports, we're going to go activate them."

"Got it." Six responded.

They hiked into the city, coming in from the south. They had to go through an abandoned warehouse.

"Suicide Grunts. Be on guard." Six told them as she snapped off a quick headshot with her Magnum.

The other two Grunts panicked and activated plasma grenades, and then ran at the Spartan and her companions.

They were both killed before they became a threat. They then ventured into the sub-level, which was a series of cramped corridors and mini-warehouses.

"Eyes sharp. On me." Six instructed.

She led them to the end of the hallway, and held up a fist, the universal command to stop.

She crept around the corner and fired twice, missing the first time but hitting the nearest Grunt in the leg the second time. The four Grunts all pulled plasma grenades and ran at the Spartan blindly.

"Get back!" She shouted as she slammed her fist into the ground and locked her armor.

All four blew up, and Six was unaffected by the blasts.

The army soldiers had taken the hint and retreated a few feet.

"Clear."

"What… The… Fuck…" One said.

"Holy shit."

"Stop gawking, boys! Let's move!" The Sergeant told them.

They cleared the sub-levels, and made it back to daylight.

"Finally! Daylight! That means no more~"

The soldier never finished his sentence, because a final Suicide Grunt ran up beside him and blew up, killing both of them.

"Carlton!"

"You bastards!"

Six stooped down and picked up an MA37 Assault Rifle that was lying near the edge of the balcony they were on. She pulled the bolt, and loaded in a round.

"Let's move."

They moved down onto the concourse below them and came face-to-face with a Brute.

"Shit!"

Six started spraying the Brute, while her comrades joined her half a second later. It went down fast thanks to the combined firepower of four AR's.

"What are those things?!" A civilian asked, panicking.

"Brutes! Move to cover!" An army soldier yelled.

"Kilo-One-Seven to Dispatch, we found Alpha Squad. They picked up a friendly."

"_Alpha? This is Kilo Dispatch. What's your status?_"

"We're assisting with the evac. We lost a man to a Suicide Grunt. And we found a Spartan."

"_Alright, then. Continue assisting with the evac._"

"Will do, sir."

"A Spartan? Where the hell did she come from?" A female trooper asked.

"Who gives a shit? She's here, and she's helping us." Her teammate answered.

Six and her companions fought their way to the last evac site, and ran headlong into a squad of armored troopers fighting a pair of Brute Chieftains accompanied by three Captains and two Grunts wielding Fuel Rod Cannons.

"Who are they?" Shepard asked, referring to the armored troopers.

"ODST's: Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. Marine special forces. Crazy bastards. They deploy on a planet using specialized drop pods. Death traps if you ask me. That earns them the nickname 'Helljumpers' since some don't survive the orbital insertion."

"Orbital insertions? Like, from a ship that could be in combat? That's… insane." Tali commented.

"That's why the ODST's are an all-_volunteer_ division of the marines. If you're crazy enough to sign up, you usually do."

"It looks like they use armor similar to yours." Shepard commented

"They don't. Their armor doesn't have shields, and it can't support a ship-grade AI like MJOLNIR, my armor. And that's just the major differences."

The team had cleared out the hostiles, and a flood of civilians boarded the nearby transports.

"_Civilian evac transport Seven-Echo-Two to Fox Actual. We're loaded up and ready to go._"

"_Not yet, Seven-Echo. Do not launch. That Corvette is still up there, it'll tear you apart._"

"_Roger that. Firing up the engines, just in case._"

"Spartan, you're needed to go help reactivate the AA batteries in the park west of here. We'll hold here. Pleasure fighting alongside you, Spartan." One of the ODST's said.

"That surprised me." Six commented in the briefing room.

"I had the impression that nothing surprised you." Garrus asked.

"ODST's and Spartans don't get along. Way before the Covenant made themselves known, one of the II's, SPARTAN-117, killed three ODST's in a boxing match shortly after his augmentations. They haven't been friendly ever since. I guess that story didn't go very far in the Corps."

Six had been picked up by a Falcon and was taken to said park where two AA batteries resided, ready to drive the Corvette out of the city.

"We have the first battery prepped, but we need to get the second one online, and then we need to activate the targeting sensors. Get over to the second battery, I have a team there, but they're pinned by a Wraith and a squad of Covenant." The man in charge of the assault, Sergeant-Major Duvall, informed her.

Six hauled ass to the second battery, where she found the squad Duvall had told her about. She snuck around the Wraith and hopped on the back, slamming a plasma grenade into the power core. She jumped off and dove away as the tank went up in a blaze of blue flames.

"Hey! We got help!" One of the marines shouted.

"About time!" Another replied.

Six and the marines neutralized the Covenant squad in just a few moments.

"Sir? It's safe to come out, the Covenant are gone."

From behind the rocks came another Spartan, with a lot of scars on his armor, and a few streaks of blood. He was holding his gut, and a purple needle was protruding from between his fingers

"Oh my God, you're hurt!" Six yelled as she ran over.

"It's not as bad as it looks, and it's good to see you again."

"How…"

She looked up into the deep blue visor of his Mk. 5 Pilot helmet.

"Don?"

"Yeah. It's me."

"It's… it's been so long… I thought you were dead."

"You know me better than that, Andrea."

"What are you doing here? I thought you were with Section Three?"

"This is what the spooks told me to do: come and help any way I could. The rest of my team is spread out, trying to repel the Covenant in other parts of the city."

"Hang on; we'll get you fixed up. I need a can of biofoam." She told the marines.

"Here. Didn't want to use it until it was safe, since someone else may have gotten injured as well."

Andrea quickly ripped the needle out of Donnell B-015's gut and applied the biofoam.

"Glad we got to that needle before it exploded."

"You and me both."

He removed his helmet and coughed up a little blood.

"Jacob… He looks just like you." Shepard commented.

"I noticed. Throw in a lifetime of military service, augmentations, and cutting-edge technology, and I'm him."

"That… and a very special connection to our esteemed Lieutenant." Tali added.

"You picked up on that?" Six asked.

"I've dealt with military men before. I can tell the difference between camaraderie and a relationship, _Andrea_." She said, as she subtly indicated to Shepard.

"So that's your real name, huh? Andrea." Jacob commented.

"A Spartan's first name is all they know, aside from their service tag. So we generally don't tell anyone except those we trust with everything, including our lives."

"Would you have told us?" Shepard asked.

"Yeah. At the end of all this, of course. I had forgotten that he used my name here."

By this point, Donnell was back into fighting shape and assisting Andrea in getting to the controls for activating the missile guidance systems. It was a relatively easy trek… for a pair of Spartans. There was a Covenant squad stationed outside the building they were going to, and it was dealt with using a few well-placed grenades, followed by a head-on charge by Andrea.

"Don't do that too often. You'll get yourself killed." Don said.

"Spartans Never Die, Don. They're just missing in action."

"You believe that load of bullshit? I thought you were smarter."

"I don't, it just seemed to fit so well right there."

They found the button which would link the guidance systems, and the batteries opened up on the Corvette. The ship hauled ass away from the city, and the transports lifted off, carrying the last of the civilian away from the war-torn planet.

"_You saved a lot of lives today, Spartan._" One of the transport pilots said over the comm.

"What next for you?" Don asked.

"Now, I go find my team."

"Guess I should too."

"Fuck it." She muttered under her breath as she turned and hugged him.

"It's been good to see you again."

"You too, An. Maybe when this is all over, we'll see each other again."

"I hope so. Make sure you keep your head down this time."

"I don't know what that means. I'll just improvise."

Six walked down to the beachhead, while Donnell started off towards the inner city.

"_Noble Five, Noble Six, this is Noble Two, do you read me?_"

"I read you."

"_We picked up your signal about an hour ago, but could not risk open comms. We're getting nothing from Jorge, though._"

"He… didn't make it."

"_Understood. What's the situation at the spaceport?_"

"The last transport is away."

"_We're sending a dropship to pick you up._"

"Copy."

Six closed the link and pulled a flare out of her armor, lit it, and threw it on the ground. She then sat down on a nearby rock and removed her helmet.

"What's left to fight for? Reach is lost. The fleets have been destroyed, as have the Orbital Defense Guns. They've won. Now, we just fight for fighting's sake." She said to no one.

"No. Now we fight to kill every last one of those alien fucks that we can."

Six slipped her helmet back on and stood up. She found a marine Sergeant with a cigar in his mouth staring at her.

"Who are you?"

"Staff-Sergeant Avery Junior Johnson. But you can just call me 'Johnson.'"

"And like I said: They may have won, but we're gonna make 'em pay dearly for every last inch of soil they glass."

"I hope you're right. Shit, now they're closer to Earth than ever before."

"And that's why we keep fighting: They have to realize now that this ain't our homeworld. Now we need to convince them that Earth is too well defended to attack with _any_ force."

"Thanks, Johnson."

"No problem."

The Sergeant left, and about 5 minutes later, a Pelican dropship flew in and picked her up.

The screen turned black again as Cortana opened the next log.

"That must have been hard for you to see him again, and now know that you won't ever." Jacob commented.

"Not really. If I made it here, then he won't be far behind. And besides: he and you are almost exactly alike. So I see him in you."

The next log was Six's reunification with Noble Team. Carter had her help Kat take down a few Covenant Jammers scattered throughout the city, and then clear out some Shade turrets so that evac Pelicans could leave. When the last one was destroyed, and the birds had left, Kat extended the landing pad.

Six walked into the room and found Noble… inactive. Waiting for new orders.

"Look at this place… used to be the crown jewel. Hmph. Not anymore." Jun said as he turned around. "Hey, you made it." He said, noticing Six.

"It's a regular family reunion." Emile commented.

Six let Jorge's dog tags drop from her hand, but she kept ahold of the chain.

"Keep 'em. He gave 'em to you. I'll honor him my own way." Emile said, holding out his kukri.

"Jorge always said he would never leave Reach." Jun said.

Emile laughed a bit.

"Oh, the big man _was_ sentimental."

"He gave his life thinking he'd just saved the planet." Carter commented. "We should all be so lucky."

"Sir, that true about Gauntlet, Red and Echo Teams being assigned to civilian evac ops?" Jun asked.

"Those are senior-level communiques." The Commander told Kat.

"I hear what I hear. Point is, why assign Spartans to civilian evac?"

"I need that link to SATCOM, Kat." Carter said, dodging the question.

"Chasing it, but this thing's got more shrapnel in it than transceivers. You never answered my question."

"You want to know if we're losing?"

"I know we're losing. I want to know if we've_ lost_ ."

She never got an answer, as the radio buzzed with static before a very familiar voice came through.

"_~in the southwest quadrant of the city, over? Sierra-259, if you are receiving, I am authorizing override of radio security protocol to link with this channel. If you are receiving, this is a priority one transmission._"

"Colonel Holland, hailing us? What's he doing on an open channel?" Kat wondered out loud.

"Can you get me a secure link?" Carter asked.

"Can't guarantee secure anymore, Commander."

"Could the Covenant trace it to us?"

"I could."

"_Sierra-259, if you are receiving, respond immediately, this is Noble Actual_."

Kat grabbed a small transmitter from the device.

"Keep it brief." She said, handing it to Carter.

Carter took the transmitter mic and talked to Holland.

"Covenant vacating the area… and they're in a hurry." Jun said.

"How often do you see Covenant retreat for no reason?" Emile asked.

"Radiation flare! Big! 40 million roentgens." Kat announced.

"Just lost Holland. What's going on?" Carter asked.

"Atomic excitement scrambled the signal. 90 million now!"

"Source?"

"Airborne, close."

"How close?"

A beam of plasma shot down from the sky and hit the ground about 100 meters away.

"That close!" Kat yelled.

The Spartans sprang into action, taking off towards the elevators. Emile, Jun, and Carter jumped in one, while Andrea and Kat ran to the other.

"First glassing? Me too." Kat said.

"Don't worry, I'm on it. Our best bet is a fallout bunker on sublevel three. We get orders from Holland, sir?" She continued.

"_We're being redirected to Sword Base._"

"_Sword? Covenant own it now!_" Jun protested.

"_Which is why they want us for a torch and burn op, keep Dr. Halsey's excavation data from falling into enemy hands_."

The elevators came to the bottom, with Carter, Emile and Jun's arriving a second before Andrea and Kat's.

"Where does he get off calling a demolition Priority On~"

Kat never finished her question, as a previously unnoticed Phantom dropship opened its bay door, and an Elite Field Marshall shot Kat right through the back of the head. Her shields hadn't charged up, and the round went clean through, leaving a small hole in the center of the Lieutenant-Commander's visor.

As Kat fell over, Andrea caught her, retrieved her pistol, and unloaded the entire clip at the Elite. The other Spartans added their own Assault Rifle fire, but they were too far away to do any real damage.

"Get her inside, now!" Carter yelled.

"Let's go, come on!" Jun yelled as Andrea dragged Kat's body into the elevator just as the doors closed.

The elevator descended in silence to the bunker. The scene faded to black as Cortana skipped over the time in the bunker.

"We stayed in there for 3 days, waiting for any sign of all-clear. We never got one, so we came out anyway, and were flown to Sword Base."

The screen came back to life, showing Six leading a team of ODST's in an attempt to clear out AA defenses around Sword. When they had done that, Six entered Sword Base. The elevators were down, so the four Spartans went through the maintenance wing to get to the atrium that would lead to the coordinates.

"Come on, up the stairs, to the left!" Carter said.

The four Spartans cleared out the atrium and proceeded to the coordinates. They found a dead end with a few fortifications.

"Looks like they got cornered." Jun said, commenting on the dead bodies.

"Or were committed to the position." Carter pointed out.

"I'm going with cornered. There's nothing here." Emile said, scanning the room.

"No load-bearing columns, either. Sir, if we're going to blow this place, this ain't the spot to do it from."

"Dot, check your vector."

"_Yes, Commander. We are precisely where ONI has directed- apologies, coordinates revised._"

"Revised?"

"_By an AI of unknown origin, whose clearance is well above my own_."

"Uh…These coordinates point a click-and-a-half east, and _2,000 feet underground_." Jun said.

"I didn't bring my shovel. Commander." Emile said.

"Sir, I say we go AI free on this one." Jun commented.

As he finished saying this, the wall behind him popped and retracted, revealing a passageway beyond. At the end was a tram car.

"Your new AI friend tell you anything else, Dot? Dot?"

There was a slight pause.

"_She's been expecting you_."

"Perfect." Emile said.

A comm screen on the front of the car lit up, showing the face of Dr. Halsey.

"_I apologize for the elaborate secrecy in bringing you here, Commander_."

"Dr. Halsey. Casualty reports have you listed as~" Carter began.

"_Yes, well, as they say 'news of my death has been greatly exaggerated'. I only wish the same could be said for the rest of your team_."

"I wish so, too. Our orders were to bury any and all sensitive data in this base."

"_Your orders were a pretext to bring you to me and have been overridden._"

"I'll need to run this new directive by Command."

"_Colonel Holland will be briefed. You belong to ONI now._"

The tram began to descend, revealing the dig site, massive in size.

"_You must come to my lab and retrieve a package to be delivered off-world._"

A few chunks of ice fell off the ceiling.

"Have your data ready, Doctor. We're coming."

"_The imprinting is not yet complete._"

"I don't think you understand. If you don't have it ready, it's getting buried."

"_Bury any of it, and you bury mankind's best chance for survival!_" Halsey exclaimed.

"_Commander, you wonder what your Spartans died for? They died for _this. _Please, buy me all the time you can._" She continued.

They did just that. For almost ten minutes, the four Spartans held off waves of invading Covenant until Halsey had finished imprinting the data onto the package.

"_Well done, Spartans. I'm opening the laboratory doors._"

The large doors behind them opened up, and the four Spartans sprinted down the long corridor to the lab. Inside they found a large artifact with glowing contrails leading to a central orb.

"What is this stuff?" Emile asked.

"Knowledge. A birthright from an ancient civilization." Dr. Halsey answered.

She turned and faced the four Spartans.

"This AI is its custodian, and she has chosen you as her courier."

"Chosen? By an AI?" Emile asked Carter.

"By this AI, yes. Her measure of you carries as much weight as my own, perhaps more." Halsey said.

She stepped to the side, revealing the AI she was referring to. She stepped over to a nearby console and began punching in commands.

"You are to take her to the UNSC shipbreaking yards in Aszod. There, you'll find a Halcyon class cruiser waiting to get her off-planet."

"I understand." Carter said.

"Do you? Mankind is outmatched. When Reach falls, and it will fall, our annihilation is all but certain. Unless we can glean from this artifact a defense against the Covenant. A game-changer. On the level of the conical bullet in the nineteenth century or faster than light travel in the twenty-third."

"And what if we can't?"

"An apt question, if there were somewhere else to place our hope. There is not."

The doctor punched in one last command and the AI's avatar disappeared from the pedestal. Halsey removed a large canister containing a glowing data chip. She walked over and extended it to Andrea.

"Take it, Lieutenant, she has made her choice."

She looked over at Carter, unsure if she should take it, and Carter gave a slight nod. The Lieutenant placed her hands around both ends of the canister.

"Do you have it?"

"Yes."

"Say the words, please."

"I have it."

Halsey let go and Andrea stored the canister on her lower back. The five then left for a pair of Pelican dropships waiting outside.

"Dr. Halsey, Noble Three will escort you to Castle Base." Carter told her.

"I require no escort, Commander."

"Jun, make sure _nothing_ falls into enemy hands."

"I'll do what's necessary, sir. Good luck."

"You too, rifleman."

Carter, Emile, and Andrea loaded into one of the Pelicans, while Jun and Dr. Halsey got into the other. Carter sat down at the controls.

"I need a heading, Dot."

"_At three kilometers north, turn right, heading 0-5-0._"

"Which leads to?"

"_The shipbreaking yards in Aszod, the only off-planet extraction point left on this continent. Covenant air units have decimated many small convoys in the area. UNSC cruiser Pillar of Autumn is awaiting your arrival. Many Covenant ships are also making haste to the site._"

"Wouldn't be a Noble mission if it were easy." Carter commented as the Pelican took off.

The Pelican was about five minutes from the shipyard when it came under attack from a pair of Banshees and a Phantom. Carter tried evasive maneuvers, but to no avail.

"Damn! I can't shake these bastards!"

"I got this!" Emile yelled, snatching up a Grenade Launcher.

He fired right into the path of one of the Banshees, hoping to make it slam into the other, but it took the hit straight on, going down in a ball of flames while the other launched a fuel rod.

"Fuel rod incoming!" Andrea shouted.

Too late. The ball of irradiated plasma impacted the fuel lines, but it didn't detonate.

"Wait… what the hell?" Garrus asked.

"Something went wrong, I guess." Andrea answered.

The outside of the Pelican began to glow blue, and a field appeared around the dropship as it gained even more speed.

"_Sierra-259, adjust trajectory to 1-9-7 by 36 to avoid fatal collision._" Dot said.

Carter adjusted the Pelican, right into the sky. A second later, he sealed the bay door as the dropship disappeared into space.

"What happened?" Shepard asked.

"The fuel must have mixed with the plasma, generating an eezo field around the dropship."

The screen turned black and stayed black.

"Cortana?"

"_You have encrypted the next log, Lieutenant. I do not have the key or the necessary clearance._"

"Alpha-9 dash 1 dash Victor-7."

"_Got it._"

The screen showed the darkened inside of the Pelican, drifting in space, lifeless. Andrea hauled herself off of the floor and found Emile just coming to next to her.

"Commander? What happened?" Andrea asked.

"Dot? Dot? You read me?" Carter asked.

"Where are we?" Emile asked, looking out the front window.

"I don't know. But this isn't Reach."

"Do we have any power?" Andrea asked.

"Nothing. All systems are dead. We're just floating here until someone finds us."

"Perfect."

"Wait… what's that?" Emile asked, pointing to the far side of the planet they were orbiting.

"Looks like a cruiser, nothing I've ever seen before."

"Wait… it's changing course to intercept us."

"Shit. We need to get out of here."

The cruiser was closing in fast, and the front began to glow yellow.

Carter dropped the back hatch.

"MOVE!"

The three Spartans jumped out as the cruiser launched a charged beam at the dropship, shearing it in half and detonating the remaining fuel. The shrapnel managed to puncture Emile and Carter's armor, but Andrea was relatively unharmed, with only her shields going down.

The two compromised Spartans fell onto the planet, along with the wreckage of the Pelican, while Andrea drifted for a few seconds before entering the hangar bay of the original Normandy.

The screen faded to black for the last time.

"Then the Normandy went down." Shepard concluded.

"That's harsh. I don't know how you haven't broken down yet." Jacob said.

"I can't afford to. Now I have something else to fight for, and I intend to do so."

"Well, thank you for trusting us with this. It must have been hard to relive all of this." Garrus said.

"Harder than you can imagine."

Andrea pulled Cortana's data chip out of the console, and put it back in her helmet.

"Understand that none of this goes past this room. I don't need Cerberus knowing anything more about me."

They all nodded.

"Thank you. And for listening."

"Crew dismissed." Shepard said.

Andrea walked back to the Armory, and was confronted by Mordin on the way.

"Lieutenant. Many questions. Can't hope that you would answer them all now. But more pressing concern. Ignoring may prove to be problematic."

"What is it?"

"Need blood sample. Testing defense against seeker swarms. Tests show that we may be able to mask body heat from Collectors, allowing invisibility from seekers. Need to run further tests, though."

"No problem."

"Excellent!"

Mordin pulled out a syringe and inserted it into Andrea's vein, taking 4ml of blood.

"Thank you. Must get back to work. Simulations to run."

Mordin walked off to the tech lab and Andrea returned to the Armory.

**Whew! Finally! Done! Holy SHIT that was long! Next up, a short chapter on recruiting Grunt and Jack, and then off to Horizon for the big first round.** **But for now…**

**GARRUS VAKARIAN! (#4!)**


	9. Chapter 8

Chapter 8: Old Wounds, Part 1

**AN's:**

_ Normandy SR-2_. _Armory._

Andrea had set up a cot in the armory, and was now fast asleep, as per Shepard's orders. In truth, she would have probably slept anyway. She was still in full armor, even her helmet was on.

_"You are weak, but we can make you strong._" A deep and terrifying voice said.

Andrea snapped open her eyes and found herself staring at the biggest squid she had ever seen. She knew that she still had her armor on, but the HUD didn't work. She felt the familiar rush of adrenaline as it emptied into her system.

_"You serve the agents of your own demise. You serve the chaos."_

A Reaper.

_"You are lost here. There is no hope for you here. We can give you purpose._"

"Like hell there isn't. I don't care what you say: I'm not fighting alongside the Reapers."

"_Then where will you fight? You have no place here. You are not from this galaxy. SPARTAN B-312._"

"How the hell do you know me?"

"_Harbinger speaks of you. You came from beyond the galactic rim, just as the others have before you_."

"What others?"

"_That is for you to discover. We will be waiting._"

Andrea woke up, confused at the Reaper's parting words.

_Others? Innies? No… they've been too busy hiding. ONI? Maybe. Best bet is Covenant._

"_You're awake. Finally, it was boring without someone to talk to._" Cortana commented.

"Yeah. Could you scan my neural patterns, and compare them with Cerberus' data on Reaper indoctrination?"

"_On it. Care to explain why?_"

"I talked to a Reaper in my dreams."

"_What did it say?_"

"It tried to convince me to join them. Then it said my name, and that 'Harbinger' knows about me, and that there are others who came here."

"_Hm… I'll take a look into that. But the scans… that's something else._"

"What?"

"_You're… in the early stages of indoctrination. That's how the Reaper was able to contact you._"

"What!? When did this happen?!"

"_This was even before you left Reach. Some of the side effects of the augmentations coincide with symptoms of indoctrination, and the neural patterns are the same_."

"So I'm going to serve the Reapers soon?"

"_If you stay away from extended contact with Reaper technology, you won't. If you are in contact with any Reaper technology for more than… I'd guess about 7 hours; you'll start to experience the signs in force._"

"Shit… I gotta let Shepard know."

"_Are you sure that's a good idea? He will probably_ _tell the Illusive Man._"

"I'm counting on just that. He'll probably have the necessary equipment to counteract this."

"_When this all goes to hell because he wants to study you, just yank me first, and then smash the chip. I'm not getting anywhere near those _things."

Cortana practically spat the word _things_ out. She _hated_ the Reapers, and Cerberus for that matter, especially the idea that the former could manipulate an organic's mind from dark space. Add in the fact that they were both synthetic _and_ organic, and Cortana was dead set on killing them all. In any way she could.

"I'll try."

Andrea walked out of the armory, garnering a confused look from Jacob. Andrea rarely left the armory, and it was not in her nature to mingle with the nearly all-Cerberus crew.

"I won't even ask." He said.

"I'll probably tell you later." She responded.

She found the Commander at his private terminal near the Galaxy Map, probably reviewing his messages.

"Commander. Something's come up. I need to talk to you. Privately."

He almost swiveled around. His eyebrows raised a bit, and then settled back down.

"We'll talk in my cabin."

The pair walked to the elevator, and Shepard punched in the command to take them to his private cabin, near the 'top' of the Normandy. When they arrived, they walked in, and Shepard sealed the door behind them.

"Must be important."

Andrea crossed her arms over her chest.

"It is. In my dreams, I was contacted by a Reaper."

"A Reaper? What did it say?"

"It tried to make me join them, tried to mess with my head. Then it said my _name_, and that there were others that came from my galaxy."

"Do you know how it managed to contact you?"

"I had Cortana perform a neural scan, and…" She was silent for a few moments.

"What is it?"

"A rare side effect of my augmentations was partial indoctrination."

"Indoctrination. So the Reapers have been manipulating the Spartans?"

"I don't think so, but the tech used during the augmentations might have derived from the Reapers, or been actual Reaper tech."

"How bad is it?"

"_She is only in the early stages. Given her extreme distance from any Reaper technology, it is also not surprising that she is in 'remission', meaning she is overcoming it. The psychological effects of watching Reach fall and then coming into a closer proximity to Reapers may have allowed them to touch her mind._" Cortana explained.

"This is bad. We need to find some way to counteract this."

"_I have already begun looking into that. It would seem that resolving her conflict about her missing team members will allow her mind to fight back more effectively._"

"So we need to go to Alchera ASAP?

"_Yes. Once we are in orbit, EDI can scan the planet for the wreckage of both the Normandy SR-1 and the Pelican._"

"Alright. Joker, plot a course for Alchera."

"_Aye, aye, Commander. ETA: 1 hour._"

"Thank you, Commander." Andrea said.

She snapped a salute and returned to the armory.

"Are you going to tell me what's going on?" Jacob asked.

"Well… it's complicated."

"Something from your past that you didn't tell us?"

"No… it's..." She took a deep breath. "When I was augmented, I developed a rare side effect: I'm… indoctrinated, if only partially. I guess finding the bodies of my teammates on Alchera will help ease my mind and allow me to fight back better."

"When did you find out about it?"

"While I was dreaming, I was contacted by a Reaper."

"That's… wow. I never saw that coming."

"Worst part is: it knew my name. It called me SPARTAN B-312. It said that others had come here as well."

"I guess it didn't tell you who the others were?"

"No. It said that I was supposed to discover that on my own."

"Shit… that must have been terrifying. I couldn't have faced a Reaper down alone, even if it was a dream."

"It was terrifying."

Andrea finally sat down on her cot and removed her helmet.

Jacob returned to his work, but kept talking to her.

"You know, you're more human than you let on before."

"I know. It's hard to keep up the whole 'cradle-to-grave military woman supersoldier' attitude when there's so much other shit going on."

"Good point."

Andrea got up and went to inspect the starboard cargo bay, maybe a new spot for her. It was empty, and big, perfect for her projects. She sent a message to Shepard informing him that she was moving to the cargo bay, and then returned to the armory to grab her tools.

"Leaving already? Am I _that_ bad of a person to be around?" Jacob asked.

"No. This room is just _that_ small. I need more space to store all of my stuff."

"Right." He said, not even trying to hide the sarcasm in his voice.

"Shut up and get back to what you were doing." She said as she left.

"_So you _do_ like him._" Cortana stated as she walked into the starboard cargo bay.

"Fine, I do. He's a nice guy. But he's just a friend."

"_That's how it all starts, Lieutenant._"

Andrea just sighed and went to work setting up the bay to her liking. When she finished, she got to work configuring the computers and checking them for bugs, and then syncing them to her HUD for easier readouts. She then meticulously scanned the room for security cameras and listening devices, and destroyed all 12 of them.

_12 fucking bugs! In one room! That's just paranoia! _The Spartan thought.

"Shit. Never seen anyone remodel so fast."

Andrea whipped around and saw Commander Shepard in the doorway. She immediately snapped to attention, pure habit, of course, and saluted.

"Commander."

"At ease, Lieutenant. Just came down to see how you were settling in."

"It'd be a lot easier if Cerberus hadn't planted _12 surveillance devices_ in here."

"12? I only counted 6 when I was here yesterday."

"Well, there were 12."

"Are you going to integrate into the local systems?" Shepard was referring to Cortana, but didn't want to risk that there was a hidden bug somewhere.

"No. Better if I don't. Less of a data trail. I only integrated my own systems into it, and that is subject to many hundreds of scanners that will detect any bug in the systems."

"Smart."

"Something else you wanted to talk about, Commander?"

"Can you think of any way to upgrade the Normandy? I don't want this one to end up like the last."

"Hm… let me see here."

Andrea stepped over to the nearby computer and pulled up a list of schematics.

"Shiva; no, too hard to build; MAC; no, too big, and Garrus probably has the whole Big-Fucking-Gun thing handled; Moray mine-layers; maybe; Here we go. Take a look at these, Commander."

Shepard walked over beside her and examined the schematic in front of him.

"Archer missile pods. Carries 20 missiles in a pod, and I could probably, with some help, outfit this bucket with 4 or 5 pods. I'd need to sync the Normandy's computers with the targeting systems for the missiles, but other than that, the hardest part of this whole thing is building the pods. We'll need to build the pods right on the hull, so that the weight doesn't pose a problem. I'd say this'll take about… 2 weeks, at the most."

"Can they punch through kinetic barriers?"

"Commander… I'd be personally offended if they _didn't_, and I could equip a single pod with nuclear missiles."

"Nukes? That's a little old-school."

"They got the job done against Covenant ships. They'll work. I promise."

"That MAC gun might be useful, too."

"Hell. No. First of all: the power drain to charge the capacitors would cripple the ship. Second: the force of the round would spin the ship out of control. And third: the gun itself is way too big for this ship. Maybe it would fit on a destroyer or a cruiser, but a frigate this size? No."

"Where do you get all of these plans?"

"_I stole them from secure UNSC and ONI databases._" Cortana told him.

"I did, too. It wasn't illegal." Andrea added.

"Way to push the boundaries of your own laws, Lieutenant."

"I'll start assembling the necessary materials, Commander."

"Thanks. Talk to you later."

Shepard left, and Andrea began to calculate what she would need for the project. She also accessed one of her databases, and began streaming some music from one of the consoles directly to her helmet's internal speakers. She chose _Beat This Summer_, by the old 21st century singer Brad Paisley.

_That's better._ She thought as the song started.

She pulled up another schematic on the side, an M392 DMR, one of her preferred weapons back on Reach.

_Why didn't I keep mine?_ She thought, mentally smacking herself.

She quickly transferred the schematics to the hardlight-projector, and began to piece together the weapon from the stock forward. She ran into a problem when she hit the firing chamber.

_Shit! No gunpowder. Gotta modify it to use thermal clips._

"Cortana? Can you pull up any blueprints for mass accelerators?"

"_I can try, but_ _access is restricted._"

"Fuck. Don't worry about it."

She grabbed her shotgun and began disassembling it, removing the metal block, which was down to about half of its original size, and the necessary parts.

_Never going to be able to use this again. So long, amigo._

She installed the components into the rifle, and finished assembling the rifle. She then began to assemble a variable zoom scope and an ammo module that allowed her to adjust the size of the round and the mass effect field, essentially making the DMR into a DMR/Sniper weapon.

A message appeared on her omni-tool. It was from Shepard.

_We're over Alchera. Be in the shuttle bay in three._

She snapped the DMR onto her back, and picked up her AR, Magnum, and SMG, and walked to the shuttle, running into Jacob on the way.

"Going down?" Andrea asked.

"Yeah. EDI found something else on the scanners, so Shepard's getting a team together to investigate."

"What is it?"

"EDI couldn't tell. We'll link up when you and Shepard are done at the crash sites and go find out."

"Sounds good."

The pair walked to the shuttle bay and found Garrus waiting with Shepard.

"Jacob told you what we found?" Shepard asked.

"Yes."

"Alright. We'll find our crash sites, pay our respects, and go investigate. Jacob, Garrus: hang back until I give the signal."

"Can do, Commander."

Andrea and Shepard boarded the shuttle and departed for the surface. They got to the Pelican crash site, and Andrea left.

Alchera in one word: frozen. The whole planet was an arctic tundra, but Andrea hardly felt it inside her MJOLNIR armor. She walked over to the Pelican's main chassis and ripped off the fused plate that covered the troop bay door. Inside, she found nothing, so she left. Then she saw the glint of a gold helmet visor. She ran over, and stopped dead at the sight of her former commander dead.

"Carter…"

She knelt down beside him and removed his helmet, and then removed his dog tags, which had long since frozen. The warmth in her hand defrosted them, and she looped them around her neck. She stood up and removed her helmet. _Cold be damned!_ She threw it onto the ground and saluted her fallen CO.

"You were the best commander I ever had. I was damned proud to have served under you. I. Will. Avenge you all. And if I die before I can, make sure to sock me in the gut when I see you again, Commander."

She replaced her helmet and found Emile's body. It was contorted way out of normal position, and Andrea finally broke down and began to cry.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I should have been better. I should have saved you both. I'm so sorry. I should have done something."

She detached Emile's kukri and sheath from his armor and attached it to her own. She formed her hand into a fist and punched her heart with the thumb side twice, just as Emile had done so many times before.

"It was a true honor to serve with you. I couldn't have asked for better teammates. I'll never forget you."

She removed Emile's helmet and undid his dog tags as well, attaching them to Carter's. As she replaced Emile's helmet, a glint out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. Upon closer inspection, she found it to be Jorge's dog tags, lost when she crashed onto the planet two years before.

"Jorge…" She merely replaced the dog tags around her neck, leaving only Kat's unaccounted for. She found them around Carter's neck.

"Are you still out there, Jun? Still putting your scope on the bad guys? Keep fighting, Snipes. For all of us. And make sure that you stay alive, because we need someone to pass on the legacy of Noble Team. Stay strong, Noble Three. Stay strong." She told the sniper, even though he couldn't possibly hear her.

She signaled that she had completed what she needed to, and Shepard signaled back that they were enroute. She pulled her last flare out of her armor and lit it, tossing it next to the Pelican and going inside, hoping to find something new in the flight recorder.

"_Wait, the fuel lines still have some fuel in them. And it's not normal fuel. I need you to get a sample._" Cortana told her.

She went out and ripped open the fuel lines, grabbing as frozen piece of the fuel as she did so.

"_Hm… This is a prototype fuel that ONI was testing. It's supposed to absorb the impact and explosions of Covenant weapons, so that the vehicle doesn't blow up and kill everyone inside. But looking at the chemical makeup, it's only about 1500 roentgens, the measure of radiation, away from element zero. That Banshee's fuel rod must have given it the necessary radiation flare._"

"Damn."

She went to the back of the dropship as the shuttle descended to pick her up. She jumped in, and they took off for the anomaly.

"Did EDI find anything else out?" She asked.

"Nothing." Jacob replied.

"Perfect. Running in blind _again_."

They landed about two minutes later, and Andrea was the first out, DMR in hand and scanning for anything.

"_Had to land well back from the site to minimize the risk of enemy contact. Radio when you're ready for pickup._" The pilot said.

"Will do." Shepard told him.

After about a minute of tense walking, they found the source of the anomaly.

"No… Can't be…" Andrea breathed.

"Is that…?" Jacob said.

"Oh, shit." Garrus said.

"Fuck…" Shepard added.

It was an intact, fully crewed and operational…

CCS-Class Covenant Battlecruiser.

**Dun, Dun, DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN! Cliffhanger! Next up: the investigation! And a few plot twists. Not much else to say, so you'll just have to wait 'till next time.**


	10. Chapter 9

Chapter 9: Old Wounds, Part 2

**AN's: **

"EDI, we need a tactical strike against the~" Shepard started.

"NO!" Andrea shouted. "A strike won't work, the shields are too strong, and you'll just waste time. Our best bet is to get the rest of the team down here and clear the ship, assuming that there are any Covenant onboard."

"You sure about this, Lieutenant?" Jacob asked.

"Yes. This is the best option."

"Alright. Joker, get the rest of the team down to my position ASAP."

"_On it, Commander. They'll be there in two minutes._"

"Fuck, not soon enough. I'm going in." Andrea said.

"Like hell you are. At least alone." Shepard said.

"Commander, I'm a Spartan. I'll survive."

"Jacob, go with her."

"Got it, Commander. Let's get going."

The two set off for the CCS Cruiser, with Jacob trailing by a good 3 feet by the time they faded from view.

"Was that a smart idea?" Garrus asked.

"If she finds anything in there, she'll hide it from Cerberus. That's a win in my book." Shepard responded.

"Good point."

_Sangheili Cruiser Endless Retribution. _

Shipmaster Feth 'Mdama watched his bridge crew spring into action as intrusion alarms rang out through the ship.

"Where are the boarders? How many are there?" He asked his 'operations' officer, Jacet 'Redau.

"There are two, Shipmaster. A Demon and a companion human. They are currently in the hangar bay."

"Humans?"

"Yes, Shipmaster. Should we send a message back to 'Telcam?"

"No. We will deal with these heretics ourselves."

"Yes, Shipmaster."

"I shall personally deal a swift death to the Demon." 'Mdama said as he gathered his cloak about him and left the bridge.

"You have the bridge, Jacet. Do not make me regret this decision."

"By my blood, I shall not."

Feth turned and left, smiling at the young Sangheili warrior's eagerness to serve. He and the rest of the all-Sangheili crew of the _Endless Retribution_ were loyal zealots of the _Neru Pe 'Odosima_, the Servants of The Abiding Truth. They believed in the old ways, ways that existed before first contact with the Prophets, and now believed that Thel Vadam, the last Arbiter of the Covenant, was wrong to ally with the humans, and now led a secret rebellion against him. Feth intensely despised all humans, and was eager to slay another Demon.

He reached to outer door to the hangar and met a lone Sangheili warrior.

"Shipmaster, The Demon and its friend have received reinforcements."

"Have any Sangheili entered?"

"No. All are awaiting you to make the first kill."

"Very well."

Feth pushed the button to open the door and stepped through as soon as the door finished opening. Inside, the Demon was flanked by six allies of varying species, three of them were unknown to Feth, and the others were all human. The former Honor Guard removed his cloak and retrieved his sword from his belt, keeping it deactivated but ready for the kill. A drawn weapon demands blood in the Sangheili culture. Be it of the user or the enemy.

"Demon! You dare enter _my_ ship? Heresy! The Arbiter may have made nice with your species, but that changes _nothing!_"

_Unknown Covenant Cruiser._

_What the fuck!? Humanity made nice with the split-lips!?_

Andrea and her team were utterly speechless. Andrea stepped forward.

"Explain. I've been… out of contact, for a while."

The Elite obviously had translation technology in its armor, as it spoke in perfect English.

"I shall explain nothing, Demon! You and your species deserve nothing but damnation for your actions!"

_Great, I'm dealing with a splinter-cell. Guess it's back to old times. _She thought.

"_Guess it's back to the old way of settling things, eh, Lieutenant?_" Cortana asked.

"Guess so."

She pulled her Energy Sword off of her belt and readied it as the Elite did the same.

"You may take my brother's weapon, but you shall never hold the honor that he did."

"Hiding on ships while you turn a planet to glass doesn't seem very _honorable_ to me." She responded, mocking the Elite's sense of honor.

That set the Elite off. It charged at Andrea, raising its sword to strike. She parried the strike and slashed with her own, almost scoring a hit as the Elite stepped back to avoid the strike.

"_Predictable,_ human." The Elite taunted.

Andrea was unfazed though. She feinted a strike to the Elite's right, and then delivered a swift punch to the left, hearing the satisfying _crack_ of ribs being destroyed as her fist connected.

"Not so predictable now, am I?" She said.

The Elite instantly recovered and the two swords clashed. As the two struggled, Jacob readied his rifle, but Shepard pushed it down.

"This is her fight. Let her fight it."

Andrea and the Elite were still in a stalemate, though the Spartan was beginning to overpower her foe. The Elite realized this, and pushed with a renewed vigor, bringing the swords back to a firm standstill. Andrea then lashed out with her leg, kicking the Elite in the gut and breaking the clash. The two exchanged blows, neither able to get a good strike on the other. There were a few times where the Elite grazed Andrea, and vice-versa, but nothing major, indicating that the two were evenly matched.

The stalemate lasted for another minute before the Elite managed to score a direct hit on Andrea's chest, gouging her shields and little else.

But Andrea had a plan. She quickly stabbed towards the Elite. It took the bait and parried the attack, and was rewarded with a fist to the face, knocking it back a few inches and giving Andrea precious seconds to stab it through the gut. She pulled the sword back out, replaced it on her belt, retrieved her Magnum from her holster, and fired two shots into its head, killing it instantly.

She holstered her pistol and retrieved her sword. None had noticed the crowd of Elites that had entered the bay during the duel.

"Who's next?!" She boldly asked, kicking the dead Elite to the side.

Three very ornately armored Elites stepped forward.

"The Demon has slain the Shipmaster! Kill it! For the favor of the Gods!"

Every. Single. Elite. In the bay readied their swords and charged at Andrea. Shepard gave the signal, and the rest of the team stepped in, showering the aliens with lead.

"Lieutenant, come on! Let's get out of here!" Shepard shouted.

Andrea took off, but one of the Elites caught her, it grabbed the back of her armor and impaled her through her back with its sword.

"NO!"

Jacob threw his rifle onto his back, readied his shotgun, and charged into the mess of Elites, firing as he went. He cleared a path and Shepard followed him, clearing the path back. The Elites backed off, gauging Jacob and Shepard's combat prowess and determining which to attack first.

Shepard and Jacob both hauled Andrea out of the bay and out of the ship. A horde of Elites prepared to follow them.

"The Demon is dead. There is no point." Jacet 'Redau calmly said.

"Leader, they are _humans_. They all deserve to die!"

"You would question my orders?! Get off my ship! You and your lineage will pay for your heresy!"

The Elite hung his head and readied his sword. He turned it towards himself, and impaled himself on it. The other Elites merely left him to die with a last shred of honor.

Outside, the shuttle had been rushed to the ship and Andrea had been loaded on. The rest of the team boarded and left the planet.

"EDI, prep a medical team at the shuttle bay, the Lieutenant is critically injured." Shepard told the AI.

"_Medics are on their way, Shepard._"

The rest of the ride was tense, as no one knew what to do for direct plasma injuries. The only thing they could do was apply medi-gel, and that seemed to at least help.

In the shuttle bay, the medics pushed through as the team disembarked, and carried Andrea on a stretcher to the medbay. Mordin followed along, offering his assistance.

"This is going to end badly, isn't it?" Tali asked, taking Shepard's hand in her own.

"I hope not." Shepard responded.

Jacob was silently cradling an Energy Sword that he had picked up during the fighting, and clenching and unclenching his empty fist.

About 5 hours later, the team was situated around the door to the medbay, when the door opened, and Andrea walked out, supported by Mordin and Dr. Chakwas.

"How bad was it?" Shepard asked.

"Not as bad as I'd thought, though it was still bad. There was some hefty tissue damage, and a few damaged organs, but nothing we couldn't fix. The injury was surprisingly clean, which made it that much easier." Chakwas reported.

"Yes. Had to flash-clone temporary organs. Not an easy process. Add in augmentations, and she was quite a challenge. But succeeded anyway. Will replace with permanent organs when they develop." Mordin added.

"Still hurts like hell, but I'll live. Thanks to these two. And Jacob's and Shepard's suicide rush." Andrea said.

"Only thing I could think to do. I couldn't leave a friend to die." Jacob admitted.

Andrea walked over and punched him in the arm.

"Next time, don't rush blindly into a horde of Elites. It's not good for your health.

"I figured."

"For her own safety, I would suggest that she stay on the _Normandy_ for a few days; to allow her injuries to fully heal."

"Yeah. Probably for the best. Thanks, Doc." Andrea said.

"It's what I'm here for. But I should check on your implants and temporary organs, to make sure there's no rejection between the two."

Andrea and Chakwas returned to the medbay, while the rest went back to their respective areas of the ship. When Andrea returned to the cargo bay later, Jacob was waiting for her.

"You scared the shit out of me when that Elite got you."

"I thought I could outrun it. I couldn't."

"You know, I don't even want to think about what would've happened if you hadn't made it."

"Me either. I'm sorry I scared you and everyone else."

Jacob remained silent for a few seconds. Andrea walked over and put her hand on his shoulder.

"Thanks. For putting yourself at risk for me."

"Like I said: I couldn't leave a friend to die."

"It still means a lot to me. I owe you one."

The two exchanged a hug, and Jacob left.

"_How heartwarming._" Cortana commented.

"Shut up."

"_I'm just pointing out the obvious, Andrea._"

"I know. Still, shut up."

"_Are you in denial, Lieutenant?_"

"Spartans don't second-guess themselves."

"_Are you sure you're still a Spartan_?"

"I would hope so. Otherwise, ONI will flip shit whenever I go back."

"_That's assuming you ever _do_ go back."_

_ "_Good point."

Andrea began compiling a list of materials she would need in order to construct the Archer missile pods. When she was finished, she sent the list to Shepard, and laid down on her cot and fell asleep. As she fell asleep, her last thoughts were of Jacob, and how he seemed willing to do anything for her.

_Well shit! He jumped into a horde of Elites unprepared and alone to save me! That speaks languages._ She thought as she drifted off to sleep.

**That's that! Another chapter. And it looks like we have a blooming relationship! (snickers a little, then eats a Snicker's® bar. You're just not you when you're hungry.) It just seemed to fit, ya know? I didn't want to go the traditional Main character/Shepard route, so I decided on Jacob. Flame me all you want, you won't change it. So don't even try. I have a fire extinguisher sitting right next to my desk, so (Assumes Hulk Hogan voice) WHAT'CHA GONNA DO, BROTHERS AND SISTERS?! WHAT'CHA GONNA DO?!**


End file.
